Factors Affecting Consumer Behaviour in Instant Noodle Industry

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With approximately 7.7509 million people, Ho Chi Minh City is the crowded city in Vietnam while Ha Noi – our capital city just has around 6.9247 million people (exclude people who do not register with any political offices) (General Statistics Office, 2012). With highest number, Ho Chi Minh becomes the largest market for consuming instant noodle in comparison to other provinces. Therefore, a research about factors influencing consumer behaviors in instant noodle industry in HCMC is indispensible for instant noodle producers.

It is also an interesting topic with many research conducted related to finding out factors affecting consumer behaviors in different industries in Vietnam. However, it seems that the studies about factors affecting consumer behavior in noodle industry are not implemented frequently. There are three mostly related studies about such topic, they are (1) “Research on students’ instant noodle buying behavior in some universities in Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC)”, (2) “A study on students’ instant noodle buying behavior in Nha Trang University” and (3) “Analyzing factors that affects customer behavior on buying instant noodle in supermarkets in HCMC” (Nguyen Phuong Linh et. al., 2012). Nevertheless, all three of them still have some gaps which need another research about factors affecting consumer behaviors in instant noodle industry in HCMC.

All of three mentioned studies took student as the main object to research. They pointed out that the student made up a large proportion of instant noodle packages consumption every year but actually this object cannot be representative for the whole consumer. Moreover, those researches just examined in specific areas such as Nha Trang city or some districts in HCMC without large diversified sample. This was a big limitation of such researches because they could not be applied totally for the instant noodle producers to examine whole consumption in instant noodle industry. Importantly, such researches were carried out several years ago, so the information might be out-dated which can lead to incorrect decision of instant noodle manufacturers. In sum, all past researches in instant noodle industry had some 3 main gaps: (1) out-dated information compares to the present, (2) non-diversify samples that cannot be generalized, and (3) limited scope leads to the difficulty in generating significant conclusion and recommendation. Therefore, it is essential to conduct another study related to finding out factors affecting consumer behaviors in instant noodle industry with wider sample in HCMC and updated information of 2013 to provide useful information for producers.

Purposes

From the fast speed in development instant noodle industry and big gaps in previous Vietnamese researches mentioned above in background part, our study is conducted with the aims to:

- Find out factors affecting consumer behaviors in instant noodle industry in Ho Chi Minh City.

- Categorize factors from most to least effective in consumer behaviors in instant noodle industry.

- Provide recommendations for instant noodle manufacturers to improve their current performances.

Research questions

The study tries to find out the answer for the research question:

- What are the factors affecting consumers behaviors in instant noodle industry in Ho Chi Minh City?

- Among these factors, which factors have the most effective? Which ones have the least effective?

Significant of the study

With the purpose to find out what factors affecting consumer behaviors in instant noodle industry, if success, it is significant and vital for performance improvement of instant noodle companies in harsh competition with both domestic and foreign rivalries. Moreover, through clearly classify which factors are favorable, which are unfavorable and the detailed degree of them from most to least effect, instant noodle producers also have right strategies to satisfy customers.

If the information in this study are careful analyzed and appropriately applied, it will be precious and valuable in increasing services and products for customers, which turns back to enhance the loyalty for business. Therefore, research about factors affecting consumer behaviors in instant noodle industry in HCMC is necessary to conduct.

Delimitation of the study

Although the study conducted in Ho Chi Minh City – the biggest city in Vietnam, it is only done survey in scope of 550 people through questionnaire and interview in some crowded districts such as Binh Thanh, Tan Binh, District 10 in specific places where large amounts of consumers come to buy instant noodles such as supermarket, markets, and retailers. From those places, it is really hard to find out the most accurate generalization for whole country as vast differences exist among the consumers with regard to demographic and psychographics characteristics. Therefore, this study might be considered appropriate for the situations similar to the study scope. Whenever applied in other areas, modification is strongly recommended.

Structure of the research

The study is organized in five chapters.

Chapter 1 is an introduction to the study with background, purposes, research questions, significant, delimitation and structure of the study.

Chapter 2 mentions about literature review of definitions, models and conceptual framework used through the study.

Chapter 3 discusses the methodology with approaches, tools, scope of study.

Chapter 4 writes about the findings analyzed from the collected data.

Chapter 5 is recommendations and conclusions.

Some additional parts are references and appendices also included.

LITERATURE REVIEW

To be successful, business must to understand well about consumer thoughts, feelings and behaviors. Those information is collected through costly research, carefully analyzed and recommended to make sure the validity and reliability. Up to now, consumer behavior is still one of the most interested issues since through analyzing consumer behaviors, marketers can better predict how consumers