A

Project Report

on

Impluse Buying Behaviour of Consumer

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment for the

Degree of Bachelore of Business Administration

S.S JAIN SUBODH P.G (AUTONOMOUS) COLLEGE, JAIPUR

(2018-19)

SUBMITTED BY SUBIMTTED TO

Ashutosh kumar Tapasya Julka

B.B.A -4th Sem. DESIGNATION:

1
 CERTIFICATE

This is to certify that the Project Report entitled “IMPLUSE BUYING BEHAVIOUR OF CONSUMER” is a
record of project work done independently by Mr. Ashutosh Kumar under my guidance and supervision and
that it has not previously formed the basis for the award of any degree, fellowship or associate ship.

Tapasya Julka

DESIGNATION

S.S.Jain Subodh P.G(Autonomous) College

Jaipur

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 DECLARATION

I, Ashutosh Kumar Student of BBA Sem IV hereby declare that the project work presented in this report is my
own work and has been carried out under the supervision of Tapasya Julka of S.S Jain Subodh
P.G(Autonomous) College.

This work has not been previously submitted to any other university for any examination.

Ashutosh Kumar

S.S.Jain Subodh P.G.(Autonomus) College

Jaipur

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 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

It is not often in life that you get a chance of appreciating and expressing your feelings in black and white to
thank the people who have been a crucial part of your successes, your accomplishments, and your being what
you are today. I take this opportunity to first of all thank the Faculty at S.S. Jain Subodh
P.G.(Autonomous)College, especially Dr. K.B.Sharma, Principal, and Dr. Rita Jain, Head, Department of BBA
for inculcating and instilling me the knowledge, learning, will-power, values and the competitiveness and
professionalism required by me as a management student.

I would like to give special thanks to Dr.Tapasya Julka for educating me silver lining in every dark cloud. Her
enduring efforts, guidance, patience and enthusiasm have given a sense of direction and purposefulness to this
project and ultimately made it a success.

I express my sincere and heartiest thanks to everyone who has contributed towards the successful completion of
the Project.

Last but not the least; I would like to thank my family: my parents for supporting me spiritually throughout my
life.

The errors and inconsistencies remain my own.

Ashutosh Kumar

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Table of Content

1-Introduction

1.1 What is Impluse Buying?

1.2 Features of Impulse Buying
1.3 Advantage and disadvantage of impulse buying
2. Reason of impulse buying
3. Complusive Vs Implusive Buying
4. Profile of the company
4.1 Overview of the company
4.2 Problem of the company
4.3 Competition information
4.3 S.W.O.T Analysis of the company
5. Resarch Methodology
5.1 Purpose
5.2 Design Methodology
5.3 Findings
5.4 Originality value
6. Backgound
7. Data Analysis & Interpretation
8. conclusion, contribution & limitation

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 CHAPTER-1

INTRODUCTION

Hypermarkets, Multiplex malls, Mega marts are the new faces of modern retailing environment in major cities
of India. The Indian retail industry is growing at a fast pace with many significant developments like the entry
of many global players, growing acceptance of the modern formats, success of many specialty retail formats
and rising competition in the regional markets beyond the metros and tier 1 cities. Today’s middle class wants
more choices and is ready to explore. Retailers are trying their best to lure customers to enhance their share of
wallet out of the total amount spent by the consumer. It is therefore important for retailers to understand
impulse buying behavior as it can aid in enhancing the sales of the firm. Impulse purchase is an unplanned
decision to buy a product. So, if a consumer walks into a store to pick up bread and also ends up buying a cold
drink, then this can be termed as an impulse purchase. There are many factors, which can trigger impulse
purchase like, age of the shopper, gender, time spent at the store, packaging, engaging displays, creative
advertising and alluring promotional offers. These factors can trigger unrecognized needs and desires and entice
consumer to purchase unintended goods, in turn, act impulsively (Inman et al. (2009)). This paper focuses on
understanding the consumer shopping behavior, with particular focus on impulse purchase behavior in the
beverage category. Beverages fall under non-essential items and are available in a variety of retail outlets like
kirana shop, pan-shops, restaurants, bakeries, etc. apart from organized retail stores. This research tries to
understand the impulse purchase of beverages across different formats of modern retail and delineate the factors
that influence it.

Features of Impluse buying:

1. Unplanned, Spontaneous, and Intense Urge to buy the product ignoring the consequence.

2. Without much prior knowledge of the product.

3. A kind of emotional and irrational purchase often for reason like fun, fantasy and social & economic
pleasure.

4. occur when a consumer experience a sudden, often Powerful and persistent urge to buy something
immediately.

5. It may stimulate emotional conflict.

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 6. Distinguised by the relative speed with which buying “decision” occur.

7.Consumer often regret on their purchase after purchasing.

Advantage of Impulse buying bheaviour

1. Mainly, marketer take advantnge of impulse buying:

 Like snacks, toffies , chocolate and soft drink are displaced on the counter or near by it. Which
force impulse buyer to buy what they might not have planned.
 Many company display their product on the eye level which attract the customer to implusively.

2. Impulse buying can really add an element of surprise to our wardrobe. You can’t plan for everything
and sometimes, you just don’t know what you want.

3. It also lets you explore some new directions. If something really appeals to you in the shops, it may
appeal to one part of your style personality that surfaces sometimes. It’s good to have clothes for different
parts of your style personality.

Disadvantages of impulse buying

1. It can lead to many buying mistakes.

2. We often buy things we don’t need. You may already have something similar and it can lead to needless
spending.

3. Disturbs the overall financial budget.

4. Often gives product dissatisfaction and less alternatives are considered.

5. People often have post purchase reget.

6. Irrational decision making, being more emotional.

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8
 CHAPTER:-2
Reason of Impluse Buying

1. Loving Shopping

The simplest explanation is that some people just derive an enormous amount of pleasure from acquiring
something new. The act of buying is an act of empowerment that may be felt all too rarely in other aspects of
life.

As children, people are often conditioned by their parent to feel good about something new being handed to
them. You only need to go back a couple of generations to understand why this was an understandable
sentiment. However, even in these tougher economic times, we can still indulge ourselves (or our kids) far more
often and novelty becomes the goal, rather than the signal of something of value being placed in your hands.

2. The Loss Aversion Switch

Stores have learned that we’re very susceptible to the loss aversion switch. Loss aversion, if you’re unfamiliar

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with the term, describes our innate concern to avoid feeling bad in the future.

Normally this would affect our purchase decisions by causing us to prevaricate over a purchase: “Might I feel
bad if I buy this and don’t have the money for something else?” But add in a discount that we’re told or we
assume won’t last forever and our unconscious focus switches to the fear we’ll miss out on the deal.

3.Twisted Heuristics

Most shopping is too arduous and time consuming to carry out with conscious attention. Imagine if every item
you bought was cross-referenced with every other product available in the market: you would need to look at
price, product composition, reviews and maybe even the quality of customer service supporting it. Even if you
could find all the information in comparable formats it would take hours to buy one item.
So instead we use heuristics – unconsciously held
rules of thumb – that help us make quick decisions that we’ve learned generally work out well.

Retailers take advantage of this by packaging up products as bulk buys, or they include ‘free’ extras.
We get the impression that it must be good value, and we go with this feeling rather than researching any
further.

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4. The Desire to Save

A
susceptibility to ‘value’ and apparent discounts isn’t just down to the loss aversion switch; many of us have an innate
desire to save. Retailers and manufacturers play on this by telling us how much money we could save by buying and
using their product.

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5. Rose-tinted Lenses

For better and worse, we routinely delude ourselves. We believe we’re better than average looking, better than
average drivers, better than average parents… clearly, we can’t all be right.

Objectivity is an elusive virtue. Rather than look back and reflect on our past actions
anything approaching a balanced scorecard, we look to the future with an idealised view of what it might be
like.

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13
14
 CHAPTER-3
Compulsive Vs Impulsive buying

Experts who have looked into the issue say that there is an important distinction between compulsive shopping
and impulse buying and it lies with the internal motivation, or reason, for the making the purchase.

While impulse buying is largely unplanned and happens in the moment in reaction to an external trigger -- such
as seeing the desired item in the shop -- compulsive shopping is more inwardly motivated.

A compulsive shopper will plan the shopping experience as a way to avoid or relieve uncomfortable internal
feelings, such as anxiety.

Compulsive shoppers are also more likely to experience negative consequences as a result of their
shopping than impulse buyers, such as running into financial difficulties, having arguments with family
members, and experiencing emotional confusion.

Compulsive Buying Implusive Buying

1.Well planned 1.Spontaneous planned
2.Rational buying 2. Irrational buying
3.Consumer gather complete 3.Consumer buy just after product
knowledge. awerness is indroduced.
4.Intention to buy 4.No intention to buy
5. Accurate decision 5.Decision error

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Factors affecting impulse buying:

 Impulse purchasing is influenced by various factors which could be external, internal

or situational.

1 Consumer characteristics:

This is one factor that significantly influences the consumption decisions of many people. Consumers
may have a tendency or trait to engage in when the consumer sees the product.compulsive buying. In most
cases, it is that consumers enjoy shopping that they end up buying things that they had not planned for or that
they do not need. Also, a person may feel obliged to impulsive buying depending on the degree to which he/she
identifies with the product. Impulse buying occurs

2 Emotions:

Most consumers expect their emotional support to be fulfilled by their social interaction, intrinsic to the
shopping experience. When they are in an emotional state that compels them to make unnecessary purchases,
buyers are often more concerned about their greater feelings of amusement, delight, and joy without thinking
about the aftermath financial consequences.

3 Visual merchandising:

Visual merchandising is meant to communicate the product value and quality to consumers. It is a ploy that
retailers use to improve the image of their stores and present what they sell to customers in a way that grabs
their attention and compels them to buy the products.

While these stores may be doing this with innocent intentions, such tactics and displays significantly influence
a consumer purchasing decision, and thus it is a great contributing factor towards impulsive buying.

4 Displays:

A well-decorated store with a beautiful and calm environment with beautiful surroundings tends to initiate
good spirits in consumers motivating them to visit the store and make a purchase even if they didn’t intend to.

Consumers get quickly attracted to beautifully set up stores and colorful displays. This is actually why most
store owners have taken up this tactic to lure customers into their retail stores.
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5 Money availability:

This together with the income level of an individual is a highly and significantly contributing factor to why
customer engages in uncontrolled buying. When a consumer has sufficient funds at the time of shopping, he/she
will extend the shopping spree to include things that they hadn’t planned for and those that they also don’t need.

The availability of money tends to develop positive feelings in individuals which consequently leads to impulse
buying.

6 Time availability:

As previously mentioned some situations can influence a consumer’s purchasing tendencies. Among such
factors include time availability. There is a close relationship between time availability and compulsive
shopping. In other words, the more time available to an individual in buying situations, the greater will be the
likelihood of the person to make impulse purchases.

7 Influence of friends and relatives:

Often impulse shoppers get influenced by their friends and relatives during shopping. A friend or relative can
sway you towards making a purchase just because they think something will go well with you. For example,
they will encourage you to buy a dress or shirt because they think it looks good on you.

8 Discounts and offers:

When it comes to buying things, there is one word that can make even the most disciplined shopper fall to his
knees. Can you guess what it is? If you answered, “sale,” then you’ve guessed correctly.

Discounts slashed prices, buy one take one – these words significantly count in making people give in to the
Shopaholic syndrome. Why? Well, people have this idea that buying things at a discount makes them good
shoppers. It makes them feel that they got the better end of the deal when in some cases, it only makes them
make unnecessary purchases.

There are a lot of other factors that influence compulsive shopping, but the ones mentioned above are among
the most common triggers that make it happen.

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 CHAPTER-4

Profile of cadbury

Overview of the company :- confectionery

Founded :- Birmingham, England, 1824 (195 year ago)

Founder :- John cadbury

Headquater :- Uxbridge, London, England

Products :-

a. Chocolate
b. Beverage
c. Biscuits
d. Gum
e. Candy

No. of Employ :- 71,657

Parent :- Mondelez International

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Competitor Available:-

a. Nestle
b. Mars
c. Ferrero
d. The Hershey
e. Perfetti Van Melle

SWOT of Cadbury

 Strength

i. Large population of Kids and teenagers

ii. Well established market
iii. Vast variety of product
iv. Priced according to indian market
v. Easy availability of coca in India

 Weakness

i. Large portion of population suffer from diabetes, cholesterol disorder etc

ii. Dental problem associated with consumption of chocolate
iii. Only does the chocolate

 Opportunities

i. Innovative uncaptured chocolate market in india –(such as sugar free chocolate sector)

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ii. Large no. occasion celebration and festival in which chocolate are used as a medium to
convey happiness
iii. Increasing acceptance of Globalisation and better relationship with forign companies

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 Threats

i. Cut throat competition from nestle, amul, mars and other international chocolate brand
ii. Negative publicity and controversy
iii. New entrance and individual player (rise in sale of homemade chocolate)
iv. Preference and availability of other substitutes (sweets & desert)

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 CHAPTER-5
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

Purpose:- The purpose of this research is to study impulse purchase of beverages across different formats of
modern trade in two metropolitan cities to the West of India; Pune and Mumbai and to try to ascertain the
factors that influence it

Design Methodology/ approach:- 93 customers in various retail outlets were observed, while shopping
beverages and the observations were recorded in a tabular form. Shoppers were not informed about the
presence of an observer and no interaction with the shopper was done in order to avoid any influence, while the
consumer is shopping. The sample was limited to two cities in western India as they were similar in terms of
demographic and cultural parameters and therefore the consumer behavior pattern was expected to be similar.

Findings:- Age, Gender and the Time Taken to Purchase were found to have a significant impact on impulse
purchases of customers, whereas number of people accompanying a Shopper showed no significant impact on
impulse purchases with reference to beverage purchases.

Originality/value:- The drivers of impulse purchase buying behavior in the beverage category can aid
retailers to plan appropriate marketing strategy to enhance sales.

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 CHAPTER-6
Background

Various studies have been conducted to find out the impulse buying behavior of the customers. Shoppers are
asked upon entering the store as to, what they intend to buy and are checked again, while they leave the store as
to, what exactly they bought to get an idea of the items picked up as impulse purchases. These studies show that
an increasing number of items are picked up as impulse purchases. Many times a shopper sees an item and
remembers that the stock at home is exhausted or going to get exhausted soon, or the shopper remembers an
advertisement on the television or radio and thereby recalls the product and would like to try it out. The shopper
sometimes remembers about a product, whose purchase decision was postponed and therefore would like to
pick up on impulse right now. Sometimes shoppers see a product for the first time and visualize a need for it,
even though he/she has not used such a product in the past. Impulse purchases can also be planned as in, if a
shopper decides that apart from the planned purchases, he/she would pick up products on which schemes,
discounts or promotions and the like are on.

When people use to shop through mom and pop stores, there was hardly any scope for impulse
purchase as the number of products, which were on display, was hardly enough to induce impulse purchase in a
big way. But with the proliferation of modern organized retail, shoppers are increasingly transferring purchase
planning to the store. They come to a store to window shop or with a general intention to buy, but end up
reaching the actual buying decision at the point of purchase. The wide display through self service and ease
with which shoppers can reach out to a plethora of products has enhanced the ability of the shopper to explore,
compare and reach a decision to purchase a product. Mass merchandising has provided a favorable environment
for impulse purchase. Retailers are therefore trying to understand impulse buying behavior so that they can
create an environment, which is conducive to impulse buying and thereby enhance sales and share of wallet of
the shopper.

One such study was done by Bashar et al. (2012) in Delhi & NCR region on the basis of demographic factors. The study
was done by collecting the primary data from 250 customers through a structured questionnaire. The research reveals that
individuals, who are young, with high disposable income, have more inclination towards impulse buying. They used
various tools like regression analysis, inter variable correlation and percentage analysis to ascertain outcomes.

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According to Gupta et al. (2009), store size is also one of the important factors, which can influence impulse
buying behavior, which means bigger the size of the store more the probability of impulse buying. The study
was carried out in the state of Chhattisgarh by collecting data through survey method. The study demonstrates
that stores that are big in size attract more customers to spend on impulse than small-sized stores. One-way
ANOVA analysis was done by them to examine the differences in impulse buying across various store sizes.

It has been observed that in-store promotions have significant influence on impulse buying. Abratt and Goodey
(1990) had done a comparative study of unplanned buying in 15 major supermarkets in South Africa. The
sample for the study was 450, collected by conducting personal face-to-face interviews with the shoppers, using
a semi-structured questionnaire in the respondent’s home language. They discussed how in-store promotional
techniques are employed to increase impulse purchases of the products. Earlier, Kollat and Willet (1967) had
done study on similar environment to understand customer intentions and its outcomes in impulse buying
behavior. The methodology used by Abratt and Goodey was similar to that is used in the research conducted by
Kollat and Willet (1967). The study reveals that unplanned purchasing is higher in the United States as
compared to South Africa, but the significance of in-store promotions result true across geographies. Chi-square
tests were performed to test the significant differences among different supermarkets with respect to unplanned
buying.
Another research
related to in-store shopping environment and impulsive buying was conducted by Tendai and Crispen (2009) in
Kings William Town, South Africa. A total of 320 shoppers were selected from the specific shops of a mall in
10 days of data collection, served as the sample. A structured questionnaire divided into 2 parts was used to
collect responses from respondents. Respondents were asked to rate various in-store factors, (e.g. background
music, coupons and vouchers, store display, advertisements and promotions, price, etc.) which influenced
impulsive purchasing in supermarket shops. Descriptive data analysis was performed to calculate frequencies
for each variables used in the study, to support the hypotheses, significant tests were done at 5 percent and 10
percent significance level. The significance test indicates that factors like background music, ventilation, in-
store scent and crowding did not directly influence impulsive buying. However, variables such as, coupons and
vouchers price, instore promotions, store display and behavior of shop staff were all likely to influence
unplanned buying.

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Title of Research Paper Author Description
A study of influence of Bashar et al. (2012) The main purpose of the
demographic factors on paper is to determine the
consumer impulse buying correlation of consumers’
behaviour demographic factors on the
impulse buying behavior
with respect to a number of
single impulsivity indicators
and one collective indicator.
In-store shopping Tendai and Crispen (2009) The objective of the study
environment and impulsive was to investigate the
buying influence of in-store
shopping environment on
impulsive buying among
consumers. The impulsive
decision making theory and
the consumer decision
making model were used to
substantiate the study
Supermarket Shelving: A Zac et al. (2012) Based on planograms,
Conceptual Paper on the information regarding a
Value of Shelf Position product’s height, weight and
position can be combined
with scanner data to provide
valuable insights into
supermarket shelves, in
particularly the impact of
position. Using a Many Sets
of Data approach, this paper
proposes across category and
market research to increase
the knowledge in the shelf
positioning.
Impact of Store Size on Sumeet Gupta et al. (2009) Research about Impact of
Impulse Purchase Store Size on Impulse

25
 Purchase
Measuring the Ubiquitous Robert and Laszlo (2009) This paper illustrates the
Consumer's Impulse significance of impulse
Purchase Behavior purchase behavior in the
consumption of M-commerce
services such as Short
Message Service (SMS)
Factors that encourage Thakor and Prajapati (2012) This paper identifies the
Impulse Purchase of women factors that encourage
for Beauty Products in women to make impulse
Gujarat purchase
The direct and Interactive Shukla and Banerjee (2011) To measure the direct effects
effects of store level of store-level promotions,
promotions on impulse brand image and price
purchase consciousness and also
examine the interactive
effects of store-level
promotions and the
moderating influence of
category familiarity
The effect of Retail Cigarette Wakefield et al. (2008) To assess the extent to which
pack displays on Impulse point-of purchase (POP)
Purchase cigarette displays stimulate
impulse purchases
The availability of snack Thornton et al (2011) The availability of snack
food displays that may food displays that may
trigger impulse purchases in trigger impulse purchases in
Melbourne supermarkets Melbourne supermarkets
Customer Impulse Kollat and Willette (1967) This article attempts to
Purchasing Behavior explain customer differences
in unplanned purchasing
behaviour
Unplanned Buying and In- Abratt and Goodey (1990) Study of unplanned buying
Store Stimuli in behavior of various countries
Supermarkets and effect of in-store stimuli

26
 across cultures. Also analysis
of variables such as brand
loyalty, specific outlet and
presence of a shopping list on
a cross-cultural basis.
The Significance of the Hawkins Stern (1990) To study the market for
Impulse Buying Today impulse items as it has
developed in the past decade
and as it is likely to develop
during the 1960s and to
refine the definition of
impulse buying also.
The Buying Impulse Dennis W. Rook (1987) This article reviews extant
research on impulsive
behavior and then introduces
a new interpretation of
impulse buying. Following
this are the results of an
exploratory study that
investigates the
phenomenology of
consumers' impulse buying
episodes. The research
identifies: (1) the subjective
experiences that distinguish
the onset of the buying
impulse, (2) how consumers
cope with their impulsive
urges to buy, and (3) the
types of negative
consequences they incur as a
result of their impulsive
buying
Influence of demographic Bellenger et al. (1978) Age has an impact on
factors on impulse buying impulse buying

27
behaviour
Unplanned buying and in- Abratt and Goodey (1990) In-store stimuli affect
store stimuli in supermarkets unplanned purchases due to
promotional techniques .
In the mood: Impulse Rook and Gardner (1993) Shoppers positive moods
Buying’s Affective were conducive to impulse
Antecedents buying than negative moods
Normative influences on Rook and Fisher (1995) Normative evaluation of the
impulse buying behaviour appropriateness of engaging
in impulse buying; Trait
buying impulsiveness was
significantly correlated with
impulse buying behaviour
Gender identity and Material Dittmar et al. (1995) Women reported social
symbols: objects and identity reasons for Impulse
decision considerations in buying behavior, whereas
impulse purchases Men reported personal
identity reasons for their
purchases
Impulse Buying: Modeling Beatty and Ferrell (1998) Shoppers positive moods is
its precursors associated with the desire to
purchase impulsively
Socio-Economic status, Wood (1998) Impulse buying changes with
Delay of gratification and age. It increases between the
impulse buying 18-39 years of age and
declines thereafter
The influence of culture on Kacen and Lee (2002) Culture has an impact on
consumer impulse buying impulse buying behaviour
behaviour
The product specific nature Jones et al. (2003) The impulse buying behavior
of Impulse buying behaviour was different for different
products

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Hypothesis development and Research Methodology

The objective of this research study is to test the influence of the various independent demographic factors like
Age, Gender, Number of People Accompanying a shopper, Time taken to purchase, on the dependent variable

The hypothesis formulated after review of the literature is given below:

H1: Age of the consumer has a strong association with the impulse buying behavior of the shopper with
reference to beverage purchases in organized retail store.

H2: Gender of the consumer has a strong association with the impulse buying behavior of the shopper with
reference to beverage purchases in organized retail stores.

H3: Number of people accompanying a shopper has a strong association with the impulse buying behavior of
the shopper with reference to beverage purchases in organized retail store

H4: Time taken to purchase has a strong association with the impulse buying behaviour of the shopper with
reference to beverage purchases in organized retail stores.
In-store observations were taken by closely observing the consumers, when they
were making purchases of beverages, across various organized retail stores.

A total sample of 93 observations was collected from various retail stores. Chi square test was adopted to
interpret the findings.

Observation Table for collection of Impulse data

Demographics Impulse Interaction

29
Date Start End Store
A Gend Accom Accom Accom Accom Accom Ag B Ti ooke Picke Purc Purch
Time Time ge er panist 1 panist 2 panist 3 panis t panist 5 e
ay me d d h in in
( (M:1, Age Age Age 4 Age Age Tot
F:0) (1:Y,0: al Sp Only Only Auto Brow
N) Gro
ent (1:Y, (1:Y, Pilot sing
up
(s) 0:N) 0:N) (1:Y, (1:Y,
0:N 0:N)

CHAPTER 7
Data Analysis and Interpretation:-

The data collected through observation tables was analyzed using chi square test. The impact of each factor
considered on the decision to make impulse purchase was evaluated. The findings of the test are described
below.

Number of people accomp\anying: The chi square test suggests that the number of people
accompanying the shopper does not impact the decision of making an impulse purchase (Pearson chi square =
0.539, Fisher’s exact test = 0.824). The study comes with an inference that the shopper makes the decision to
purchase a beverage individually; presence of friends or family members does not influence this decision. Table
III depicts the cross tabulation of Purchased in Impulse and Number of People Accompanying.

Table III: Cross Tabulation of Purchased in Impulse and Number of People Accompanying

Number of people accompanying

0 1 2 Total
Purchased No 12 17 3 32

on impulse Yes 25 28 8 61
Total 37 45 11 93

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Age group:-

The chi square test reports that there is a significant difference between the impulse purchases made by
different age groups (Pearson chi square=5.523, Fisher’s exact test = 0.046). It suggests that the age group,
which lies between 30 to 40, has a higher percentage of shoppers making impulse purchase than the other two
age groups i.e. between 20 to 30 and greater than 40.

Hence, it can be concluded that age of the shopper influences the impulse purchase
decision. Shoppers younger or older than the shoppers of age group 30-40 years tend to stick to their shopping
list. Table IV depicts the cross tabulation of purchased on impulse and age of the consumers.

Table IV: Cross Tabulation of Purchased on Impulse and Age of the Shopper:-

Age
Purchased No 20-30 30-40 40+ Total

o n Impulse 26 3 3 32
Yes 38 19 4 61

Total 64 22 7 93

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Gender:-

The chi square test results between gender of the shopper and their decision to purchase on impulse, indicates
that the impulse purchase decisions are influenced by gender. Impulse purchase made by female shoppers as a
percentage of total purchases are significantly higher as compared to their males counterparts (Pearson chi
square=3.145, Fisher’s Exact Test = 0.089 at 10% significance)

Hence, we can conclude that females make more impulse purchases than male shoppers. Females are
more flexible in adding unplanned items to their shopping than males. A reason behind this observation can be
that more females evaluate the need for an item after looking at it, whereas more males buy according to their
plans. Table V depicts the Cross Tabulation of Purchased on Impulse and Gender of the consumer.

Table V: Cross Tabulation of Purchased on Impulse and Gender

Gender
Purchased on No Male Female Total
impulse 5 27 32
Yes 20 41 61

Total 25 68 93

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Time taken to purchase:-

According to the chi square results the decision of impulse purchase varies by the time taken by shopper to
make the purchase decision (Pearson chi square10.682, Fisher’s exact test = 0.004). Shoppers taking 3 to 5
minutes in taking the decision to purchase make fewer impulse purchases than those taking lesser or more time.

We can conclude that shoppers decide to purchase a beverage either without taking much
time to decide or contemplating about their decision. Shoppers who decide not to make a purchase are more
likely to do so in 3 to 5 minutes. Table VI depicts the Cross Tabulation of Purchased on Impulse verses Time
Taken to Purchase.

Table VI: Cross Tabulation of Purchased on Impulse and Time Taken to Purchase

Time Taken to Purchase

Purchased Less than 3 3 to 5 mins More than 5 Total
mins mins
on impulse
No 6 25 1 32

Yes 30 26 5 61
Total 36 51 6 93

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Conclusions, Contributions and Limitations:-

Impulse purchasing is increasing among the shoppers with the proliferation of organized retail in India.
Over a period of time, retailers are conducting extensive research to understand what appeals to the senses of
the shoppers into making impulse purchases. Retail stores are being designed such that they are more spacious,
have soothing music, have well lit aisles and present an overall serene environment, which appeal to the
shoppers. The increasing disposable income of shoppers is also adding to the increase in impulse purchases. E-
commerce is playing a significant role in enhancing impulse buying as shoppers can have access to a variety of
products, along with price and product comparison, which lures them to buy on impulse.

The current study has made an effort in the direction of understanding impulse buying behavior with respect to
a number of single impulsivity indicators in beverage purchases. The study reveals that Age, Gender and Time
taken to purchase impact the impulse buying behavior positively, whereas Number of people accompanying the
shopper does not impact the impulse buying behavior significantly. These findings can enable a retailer and the
beverage company; design an appropriate strategy to lure the consumer to make impulse purchases.

It is important that shoppers cannot focus exclusively on increasing unplanned purchases as unplanned
purchases can also be a result of stocking up goods, which are required in the future. In such a situation, the
retailer does not benefit much, as the stocking up behavior will result in reduced sales later. Only items, which
were never planned by the shopper, but picked up are true impulse purchases and they enhance the sales and
profitability of the store. This limited study will provide some guideline into further research in this area. There
are several limitations while doing the study, which must be kept in mind, when considering the results. The
sample size is small and caters to only two cities i.e. Mumbai and Pune. The results therefore cannot be
generalized and should be cross validated using diverse product categories and in other cities and therefore the
current study provide a guideline for further analysis. Moreover, it is necessary to replicate the findings using a
large sample and across the country so that conclusions can be used for developing a marketing and sales
promotion strategy, which can be implemented across the country.

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Finally, the study illustrates various observations for retail stores, particularly the demographics of customers
and time taken to purchase that an organized retailer should consider while developing an appropriate strategy
entice shoppers into impulse buying. Impulse buying can be favorably influenced through distribution,
advertising and store promotion. Future research can look at the intersection of the different demographic
parameters and time taken to purchase along with varied in-store advertising and sales promotion strategies.

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