Final Project
Consumer Behaviour
Discovery of individuals’ underlying motivation through consumption of cider
and alcoholic beverages
Table of Contents
OBJECTIVE OF PROJECT 3
BRAND INTRODUCTION 3
USAGE OBSERVATION 4
Interviewee one 4
Interview two and three 8
SHOP-ALONG 10
Screening 10
Pre-shopping 12
Brand loyalty 12
Packaging 13
Shelving Layout 13
Pricing 13
Post purchase 14
MANAGERIAL RECOMMENDATIONS 18
CONCLUSION 20
BIBLIOGRAPHY 21
2
OBJECTIVE OF PROJECT
The aim of this project has been to discover individuals’ underlying motivations when
purchasing a product. Our group decided to use cider as our product, and was
initially thought of when gathering information through a usage observation and a
shop along. Although along the way, we noticed that none of our interviewees we
evaluated in our shop along wanted to purchase cider, hence our analysis has been
made for alcohol in general, but with a little more focus on cider.
BRAND INTRODUCTION
Cider is an alcoholic beverage, which is usually made by fermented apples. It comes
in two varieties, sweet (as for instance Rekorderlig, Kopparberg) and dry (for example
Aspall). The alcohol content can vary from 1,2% to 8,5% and can be served cold and
warm, in drinks and in cooking. Cider is usually bottled in glass bottles, cans or on tap
at pubs.
The dry cider is only made by fermented apples in a traditional way, but the sweet
cider is usually based on a pear and/or apple wine, among flavors like strawberry,
lime and passion fruit. The production method varies between countries due the
difference in to laws and regulations. In the UK, you can find cider in regular grocery
stores, specialist retailers or other stores where you can find alcoholic beverages.
The history of cider takes us back before the birth of Christ. It is believed that Jews
and Romans made juice from fermented apples (converting the fruit sugar from apples
to alcohol) and drank it. This happened for more than 2000 year ago.
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According to Hippocrates, who is considered to be the father of medicine and Pliny
the Elder (Roman author), Greeks consumed this drink too, 5 Centuries before Christ
(Watson, 2009).
The time after the birth of Christ, people in England started to drink Cider after the
Norman Conquest ended, which was in the middle of the 11th century. Many
researchers believe the reason the product came to England during this time period is
because the Northern part of France and the Southern part of England had several
vineyards that made wine the most dominating drink. The effect of bad weather
conditions resulted in a decrease in production, because it became harder and harder
for the grapes to survive, and slowly wine started to get replaced by cider
([Link], 2014). Nowadays, United Kingdom consumes the majority of the cider
in the world. It is associated with the British countryside and midlands, such as
Suffolk, Worcestershire and West Midlands.
USAGE OBSERVATION
Interviewee one
Our first interviewee, user one, was a 21-year-old female from Sweden. Our second
and third interviewees, user two and three, are around the same age, from Hong Kong
and Germany. The differences between the interviewees that made their opinions of
the cider so diverse was mainly because of their geographical, demographic and
psychographic differences. User one was a relatively frequent user of the product,
whilst user two and three had never tasted it before.
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User one first tried cider when she was a lot younger, around 16 years old. Her mother
introduced her to the sweet beverage, since her older sister and mother often had a
bottle in the fridge at home. User one grew up in a home where a lot of sodas were
consumed, and the taste of cider is very similar, thus the interest in cider in the
beginning. Also, user one’s sister was back then a person she looked up to and
watched her behaviour also called modeling, which is the process of imitating the
behaviours of others. She got a feeling of equality towards her mother and the other
grown-ups. User one enjoyed the feeling of fitting in and wanted to act more like her
adult mother and sister. Ultimately, her first impression and attitude towards cider was
related to something grown-ups consume, and she felt a sense of social security and
belonging. At this time, her mother and sister were user one’s reference group with
referent power over her evaluation of the product. A reference group is a group or an
individual that serves as a point of comparison for another person or group. They
influence the image that the individual has of itself as well as his or her behaviour.
What is interesting about user one, is how radically her attitude towards cider changed
as she grew older. Today, five years after tasting the product for the first time, she
perceives the drink to be consumed by a younger crowd and no longer wants to be
related to the product. As she has grown older and come across new cultures,
environments and social influences, she perceives someone who drinks a glass of
wine as a mature woman, which is a characteristic user one aspires to attain.
User one has had a motivation to reach maturity since she lived at home with her
parents and sister at the age of sixteen.
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The dynamic nature of motivation is those needs are never fully satisfied, new needs
emerge when old needs are no longer getting satisfied. User one was satisfied when
she started consuming the product, but now, when she can buy the cider herself, and
less people she knows buys cider, she no longer gets the feeling of “being adult”, and
instead relates the product to teenagers. Her friends and acquaintances no longer buys
cider, they buy wine. Therefore she no longer gets the feeling of being adult when
consuming cider. Her value of cider has decreased heavily over the years, and she
does not like the feeling of youth, she wants to feel the opposite. Here is a clear
experience of cognitive dissonance, because she realised how her primary values for
the cider conflicted with her observation of other people’s consumption of the cider.
The theory of cognitive dissonance implies that the contradictory beliefs results in
discomfort, and as people we strive for internal consistency in our everyday lives. In
order for her to reduce the dissonance, her goal is to avoid purchase of cider, and
behave like her older friends who purchase other alcoholic beverages.
User one has got extrinsic values that she desires to achieve, which is the sense of
adultness and maturity, and in order for her to reach that point, she actually wishes to
decrease her consumption of cider. Before, the consumption of cider was related to a
positive thing, and her reference group exerted positive influences in that sense that
she felt like she belonged to the social group she was currently interacting with. But
now, her reference group is instead dissociative, so her motivation is now to distance
herself from the type of “typical” consumer she would perceive to drink cider.
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User one has got several friends who are around the same age she was when she
consumed cider. When she surrounds herself with them, it is a lot easier for her to
drink cider without feeling that it is wrong, especially because they drink more cider
than any other beverages. Throughout our observation, we could tell how other people
influence her choice of beverage, because almost always it depends on whom she is
surrounded by.
Through application of the expectancy theory, she has now got expectations of
achieving some desirable outcome, which are positive outcomes that ultimately
motivates her behaviour. Through decreasing her consumption of cider, she will reach
that desirable outcome. If we look at Maslow’s hierarchical pyramid below, we can
find user one’s values somewhere between the social needs and self-actualisation,
because of her feeling of belonging, status and a boost of self-esteem. Her social
needs are related to her choice of beverage when with other people that really affect
her choice.
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Interview two and three
Our next two interviewees had so far no experiences with cider, this makes them
interesting subjects to study based on the fact that they would be able to give a more
honest opinion on what they feel when they taste the beverage. Both interviewees had
similar associations while trying the cider. The 19-year-old male associated his drink
with summer and vacation – especially because of the acid. However, he had the
general opinion that it was rather feminine. He wouldn’t drink cider again despite the
fact that he enjoyed it. Reason for that is his fear of being judged and believes that his
friends would judge him. He perceives cider to be women’s drink, and men should
drink something stronger, like beer or whisky.
As we know, suggestions from our environment could also change one's self-
perception. This shows us, that society pressure can affect consumer’s perception and
behaviour. His focus is not stimulating his needs and wants but trying to fit in a
society model. This means, that he does not look at his own values and beliefs but
what the given values of a certain society model are (or what he believes they are). In
this case the society model are his friends, maybe family and even strangers around
him.
Our female inexperienced user of the product would consider purchasing the cider in
the future, although only for consumption at home. Reason behind this was that her
friends do not drink it, and we ultimately discovered another example of desire for
“fitting in” with the group, as with user one and two. User three feels the same need
of belonging, and would therefore choose a more common drink consumed by her
friends.
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Diagram 1.0 - Reference Groups
With the help of diagram 1.0, we would like to explain this observation too with the
theory of reference Groups introduced in the first interviewee. As you can see in the
diagram, the family influences an individual the most, the second strongest reference
group is friends. However, our opinion is that this can change within different age
levels. These friendship groups are informal because they are usually unstructured and
lack authority levels.
Both interviewees are highly influenced by their groups of friends. First they were
happy to try something new, they basically showed openness to change.
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However, after trying the cider, their attitudes changed. Interviewee two stated that
she would not drink the cider in public with her friends, simply because none of her
friends drink cider. This is called a normative influence – we conform to group norms
in order to belong to the group. Choosing to consume cider, interviewee two is afraid
of being part of a group he does not wish to be included in. Both realised that self-
direction and openness to change could threaten their social environment.
Seeking and maintaining friendships is very important for individuals as they can
provide security and opportunities. This could be a reason why people, in this case all
interviewees, put so much value in not standing out of line.
SHOP-ALONG
For our shop along we want to gain an understanding of underlying motivations,
wants and needs that drives people to buy brands within alcohol based beverages, our
chosen product category. It’s based on two interviews from customers of the shop
Amathus in central London, which is a specialist retailer within wines and spirits.
Screening
The first interviewee was Danny, a 32-year-old man whom was already enriched with
knowledge of alcoholic beverages, after working in the restaurant business for several
years. Amathus is his local shop because of their “pretty good selection” of brands.
This day, Danny bought a bottle of whiskey (Blanton’s Single Barrel Original) and a
couple of beers (Brewdog punk IPA) for himself and his friend. Danny usually buys
alcohol without company “My friends usually go for the cheapest products and I’m
glad to pay more for something better”.
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He is not influenced by any advertising “I know too many working in that business, so
I don’t trust them” he says and laughed afterwards. Danny usually listens to Nick
(employee at Amathus) and local bartenders’ recommendations. He is open to try new
beverages. His motivations and drives of buying alcohol is a need he feels and his
“awesome moments” he gets from it. His quote refers to the environment he typically
is in whilst drinking alcohol, for example socialising with friends at a bar or during a
dinner party. He is well aware of what alcohol does to his body “and even if it’s not
good for my body, I can’t help that I love it”.
The second interviewee was Diane, a 67-year-old lady who is not as experienced as
Danny when it comes to brands of alcohol. Amathus is on her way home and she
stops by fairly frequently, usually together with some friends, her husband or sister in
law. This day Diane bought a bottle of vodka (Grey Goose) to enjoy the evening, and
some bottles of wine (from two unknown brands) for a future dinner party.
She likes to get influenced by others if she would like to try something new “I usually
go for something that looks fun, so I go by the label” she says with a smile and the
wine bottles. “It would not be a good dinner party without wine”. Alcoholic beverages
help her to fulfill her wants and needs and she is driven to buy alcohol due to the
enjoyment of it. She is aware of what alcohol does to her body; anyhow, she prefers to
look at the good over the bad “It actually makes me a much better dancer than I think
I am”.
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Pre-shopping
Danny is spontaneous in his purchasing; he doesn’t plan it in advance. He usually
knows what he needs for different occasions, which is also the underlying factor for
his choice of brand and product. This occasion, the whiskey had been recommended
to him earlier. Here we can find stimulation factors that Danny values. He is an
independent man who is open for variations and like excitements in life. At the same
time he is a huge Hedonist that values to enjoy life and pleasures. In Diane’s case, she
knows already what to buy; no planning is needed, since she always buys the same
brands. The event and habits is the underlying factor of her buying. Her lack of
knowledge and unwillingness to try new beverages make her belong to a very narrow
target group for different brands. Here we can find traditional and conformity factors
that Diane values. For instance, she’s moderate and has self-discipline in her buying
and values an overall security because of her lack of knowledge. At the same time she
shows factors of Hedonistic values because of the pleasure she gets from consuming
alcohol.
Brand loyalty
Danny has 4-5 favourite brands he usually goes for. This day, he decided to buy a
different whiskey he has tried earlier. He knows friends and bartenders that also buy
the same brands and he would describe the typical consumer as “a more serious
drinker”. Diane always buys the same brands, so it’s hard to convince her to try
something else. She believes she has purchased the same brands since they were
released onto the market, and she also knows friends who choose the same brands.
However, she is uncertain of the typical consumer of the brand.
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Packaging
Danny loves the bottle, he does not want the design or the size of the bottle to be
changed, “it’s unique and you can distinguish them from the other bottles on the
shelves”. The packaging influences him in a positive way since the whisky bottle have
handwritten batch and bottle numbers, he values that tradition. “They took time on
creating the bottle, hopefully they use the same effort on the whiskey”. Diane likes the
design of the bottles of her chosen brands, despite her inability to find them on the
shelves. She doesn't want to change anything with the bottles.
Shelving Layout
Danny likes the positioning of the products on the shelves, they were easy to find and
he would not change the way it’s organised. Diane is pleased with the positioning of
the vodka, she’s not that pleased with the wine though “I do not know why you need
that many bottles, they just blend together!”
Pricing
Both Danny and Diane think their chosen brands are worth the price, and it’s
appropriate for the value. They both would probably change brand if the price
increases by £10. Danny values the quality and would like to try a new product if its
price decreases or gets on sale. Diane would never know if the price of another brand
decreases and would probably not buy another brand if it were on sale.
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Post purchase
After interviewing only two people, we can conclude that every human is unique in
their tastes and preferences together with their underlying needs and motivations,
which drives them to buy alcohol. Alcohol is one of our egoistic needs according to
Maslow and his hierarchy of needs. Alcohol helps the self-esteem, which Diane has
proved for us when she explained what alcohol does to her sense of dancing, which is
also an underlying motivation for her to buy alcohol. If we follow Schwartz
Circumplex of core values we can find Danny within the Openness to Change after
recognise his Stimulation and Hedonism values. He is all about the pleasure he feels,
as well as freedom, excitement, and add of enjoyment in life, and is therefore clearly
fitting into “openness to change”.
For Diane, we can find her within the Conservation side of values, after recognition of
her traditional and conformal values. For both Danny and Diane, these values are also
their underlying motivations of buying alcohol.
We introduced Schwartz’s value structure when discussing the more inexperienced
interviewees, who tried cider for the first time when we observed them. By using
Schwartz’s structure, we can find them first with a value, which stands for openness
to change, because the taste gave them pleasure and excitement, as explained earlier.
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Diagram 2.1 - Schwartz’s value circumplex
Diagram 2.2 – Schwartz’s value model
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INSIGHTS
According to our observation interviews, a consumer’s decision-making process is
highly dependent on our social surroundings, experiences and personal goals. A very
prevalent model is the “Utility Theory”, which states that consumers make their
decisions based on their expected outcomes. This theory sees the consumers as a
rational decision maker who is only concentrated on his self-interests.
In order to decide rationally the consumer has to be aware of other consumption
options and have all the information about every single one of them. These aspects are
however not realistic as consumers rarely have information about all product
alternatives and the motivation and time to make the perfect decision.
In addition, decisions are often influenced by less rational influences such as values
and the social environment. For Example, interviewee one and two decided not to
purchase cider again because it is against their personal goal - belonging to a group,
which is “cider-free”. Products and services we consume often reflect our beliefs and
attitudes. They are symbolic of what we think is acceptable to our reference group - in
this case, family and friends. Alcohol is one of our egoistic needs according to
Maslow and his hierarchy of needs. Alcohol helps the self-esteem and will heighten it,
which Diane has proven when she explained what alcohol does to her body language
and increased feeling of dancing, which is also an underlying motivation for her to
buy alcohol. Alcohol also helps us reach our ideal self, but of course, everything can
also have the opposite effect, depending on how you react on alcohol. It can also
bring us down, look at our actual self and lower our self-esteem.
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But it doesn't seem like that in Danny and Diane’s (ideal) cases. According to what
Diane said, “I usually go for something that looks fun, so I go by the label” we can
understand her decision making process when she is choosing brands. Her lack of
knowledge and insecurity in herself makes her go by the label with attributes that she
founds fun. According to the hierarchy of effects, Diane belongs to the experiential
hierarchy because of her hedonic consumption since she chosen her product and brand
based on the label, which is an emotional reaction. She also fits in to the low-
involvement hierarchy because of her lack of knowledge.
Danny, is best fitted into the opposite of Diane, and belongs to the standard learning
hierarchy because of his high involvement and motivation to search for information
and recommendation for specific brands.
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MANAGERIAL RECOMMENDATIONS
As stated earlier, our interviewees from both observations had very diverse
backgrounds, which we sought in order to achieve more information about the
consumer’s underlying motivations. The red thread along all our observations was
that these customers’ purchase patterns was very dependent on their social influences.
The common opinion amongst the interviews was their relatedness to teenagers, even
for our interviews with no prior knowledge of what cider was. User one, who has had
great experience of the product for several years could be difficult to “turn” for
marketers, and change her opinion.
Perhaps marketers should focus on new segments or users, like interviewee number
two and three, and try to raise social influences in advertising and promotion. We
believe cider was very popular when it first was introduced to the market, but the
marketers also positioned the drink as a cooler to drink over ice during summer time,
which we believe could possibly be the wrong approach because of the decrease in
sales during other seasons. For example, the Swedish brand Rekorderlig cider has
introduced a “winter drink”, which is best served warm.
We believe marketers should adapt the product to fit all consumers of it, and
accomplish an updated market research. One of the interviewees perceived the cider
as very feminine, perhaps cider companies could try to produce a cider towards men,
with proper qualitative research behind the idea.
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Finally, we came across the fact that there is not really a known celebrity or figure
that is related to cider. Heineken made a commercial with Daniel Craig and the bond
film Skyfall, possibly a great value of word of mouth activities like “Have you seen
the new commercial with Daniel Craig, it’s so funny, and it’s for Heineken!”
Unconsciously the brand could be on your mind next time you go to the store or go
out, depending on how you as an individual perceive and receive and store
information and influences. If cider companies try to invest money in campaigning
and making commercials with a celebrity a lot of people relates to, an icon for cider.
Another example of how a celebrity or figure would be good to relate with cider is the
example of Nespresso and George Clooney. Since many people have never tried or
heard about cider this could be helpful. When people ask, “what is Nespresso”, they
usually get the answer “it’s the coffee machine with George Clooney in the ad” they
immediately can connect what it is. This would be helpful to boost the Cider
companies’ sales since cider would be related to the celebrity and that would make
people want to try it. As mentioned before, many people have not heard about Cider.
Cider companies should use different channels to send a clear message to potential
customer of who and what they are. This phenomenon is called brand communication,
which aim is to engage and inspire customers. The best channel to do this would be
social media (Facebook, twitter etc.) since everyone is more or less using social media
and it is easy to access it.
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CONCLUSION
For over 2000 years, we have consumed cider, a beverage that exist in two different
types which would suit mostly everyone. However, even if it is an old beverage, it’s
not known by everyone. In this report we have summarised our findings through a
usage observation and shop along, as well as given our managerial recommendations.
The recommendations provided will help the Cider companies to reach their
customers’ needs and to help the cider companies to improve the sales. We have
written a couple of suggestions that we think will be most helpful, and have based
these recommendations on the answers of the usage observation and the shop-along.
What we can conclude in the recommendations is that cider companies needs to have
a geographically product variation. Cider companies could start to offer a warmer
cider drink during wintertime, as Rekorderlig have done, since many people prefer to
drink something warm instead of something cold.
Companies and marketers could possibly segment a new product towards the male
crowd, since many of the users in the usage observation thought that cider was a
feminine drink. They could make it stronger or make it taste of alcohol for an
example. A suggestion for improving their sales is to hire a celebrity to be featured in
the advertisements. Many people have never heard about cider before nor tasted it, so
when they see that a celebrity is in the commercial they will know what cider is since
the celebrity is related to it and the person would most probably want to try cider.
We live in a very hectic and success driven world, where people tend to seek for
occasions where they can experience freedom and outright frivolity. Cider companies
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could use this behaviour and create adverts, which talks about these aspects and gives
the consumer and experience of “escaping the serious world”.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
[Link], (2014). Styles of Cider | National Association of Cider Makers. [online]
Available at: [Link]
[Accessed 26 Nov. 2014].
[Link], (2014). Origins of Cider | National Association of Cider Makers.
[online] Available at: [Link] [Accessed 26
Nov. 2014].
Watson, B. (2009). Cider, hard and sweet. Wodstock, Vt.: Countryman Press.
SIMON, H., 1997. Administrative Behavior: A Study of Decision-Making Processes
in Administrative Organizations. 4th ed. ed. New York: The Free Press.
Fisher, C. (-). Group Influence on Consumer Behavior. Chron. - (-), -.
CMO Network. (2014). Six Trends That Will Shape Consumer Behavior This Year.
Forbes. - (-), 1.
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