The influence of selected consumer-based brand equity elements on brand preference and purchase intention towards store brands

Abstract

Supermarket store brands are affordable alternatives towards the customers’ intended brands. For many years, marketers and retailers of store brands have positioned this brand as a cheap or low-cost brand that could be afforded by most customers. This positioning has catapulted the popularity of store brands. However, on the downward side, most consumers associate cheap or low cost with low quality. The low-cost and low-quality association and perception has been a major impediment towards the real success of store brands. Store brands have long since moved from competing on price, to competing on quality. The shift of focus by marketers and retailers of store brands from price to quality puts store brands on an equal footing with national brands and, consequently, a fierce competitor. This study investigated the influence of consumer-based brand equity elements, namely brand awareness, brand association, brand loyalty and perceived quality on brand preference and purchase intention of store brands. This study restricted its scope to the food brands. Investigating store brands within a South African context is particularly important since store brands are produced and owned by local retailers as opposed to national brands. The literature suggests that store brands are more profitable to retailers compared to their counterparts and serve as a point of differentiation from one retailer to another. A quantitative research design was employed in this study and a non-probability convenience sampling technique was adopted. The target population comprised students from a tertiary institution within the Vaal triangle, namely Vaal University of Technology. A total of 400 questionnaires were distributed to the participants, of which 361 participated in the study. To ensure reliability of the scales, pre-testing and piloting of the questionnaire preceded the main survey. Results from correlation and regression analysis revealed that brand equity elements, namely brand awareness, brand association, brand loyalty and perceived quality explain 68.4 percent of the variance in brand preference. This result suggests that consumer-based brand equity elements significantly contribute towards building consumer brand preference towards the store brands. In addition, amongst all the variables, brand loyalty made the strongest contribution towards explaining brand preference (β= 0.342). Moreover, brand preference explains 65.3 percent of the variance in purchase intention. These results suggest that brand preference strongly contributes towards building purchase intention of store brands. Based on the results of this study, recommendations for retailers of store brands are provided as follows:  Retailers of store brands should implement greater awareness programmes for store brands and create positive word-of-mouth through superior product quality.  Retailers of store brands should strengthen store brands’ brand associations to improve the image of store brands.  Retailers of store brands should pay special attention to creating brand loyalty of store brands through implementing store brands’ loyalty programmes. Limitations, future research opportunities and contributions of this study are discussed in the study.