Persepsi risiko mempengaruhi pemilihan pembelian antara private label brand dan national brand
WIBOWO, ANNAS I. , Dr. BM Purwanto, MBA
Private label brand telah diteliti dalam literatur lebih dari empat puluh tahun (Narasimhan and Wilcox, 1998). Seiring pertumbuhan private label, periset telah melihat kepada faktor-faktor yang berpengaruh dalam upaya mengetahui alasan-alasan kesuksesan private label. Konsumen, sebagai pihak di sisi demand akan fast-moving goods, persepsi mereka sangat mempengaruhi keputusan memilih merek, dan mempengaruhi kesuksesan merek-merek.
Meskipun topik private label telah lama diteliti, volume riset mengenai private label kurang dari studi-studi mengenai merek nasional. Penemuan dari studi-studi private label sebelumnya telah memberikan pengetahuan mengenai perilaku konsumen untuk akademisi dan praktisi untuk membuat teori dan strategi merek. Namun demikian, permasalahan masih ada dalam literatur, mengenai pengaruh faktor konsumen level kategori seperti persepsi risiko. Persepsi risiko adalah konstruk penting untuk menjelaskan kecenderungan konsumen membeli private label. Perbedaan dalam level kategori merupakan sumber yang sangat penting untuk menjelaskan variasi dalam kesuksesan private label (Batra and Sinha, 2000; Dhar and Hoch, 1997).
Penelitian ini mereplikasi studi Batra and Sinha's (2000) yang meneliti efek dalam level kategori dari beberapa determinan persepsi risiko pada preferensi konsumen dalam membeli private label. Tujuan penelitian ini adalah utnuk meneliti ulang hipotesis mereka.
Survei mall-intercept dilakukan untuk menguji hipotesis. Hasil penelitian mengindikasikan bahwa determinan persepsi risiko seperti konsekuensi kesalahan pembelian dan derajat variasi kualitas, juga price consciousness berpengaruh secara signifikan pada kecenderungan konsumen untuk membeli private label. Kecenderungan private label tersebut berbeda-beda antar kategori produk karena variasi level kategori dalam persepsi dan sikap. Konsumen cenderung membeli private label dalam kategori yang mereka mempersepsikan variasi kualitas lebih rendah antar merek, yang mereka memiliki price consciousness lebih tinggi, dan yang mereka mempersepsikan konsekuensi membuat kesalahan pembelian lebih rendah.
Penemuan penelitian ini adalah bahwa analisis faktor-faktor konsumen level kategori dapat menjawab pertanyaan mengapa kesuksesan private label berbeda-beda antar kategori. Cara yang lebih baik bagi produsen merek nasional dan peritel dalam bersaing adalah melalui peningkatan kualitas produk. Produsen merek nasional sebaiknya berusaha menjaga level kualitas merek nasional di atas private label, peritel sebaiknya berusaha mengurangi perbedaan kualitas untuk private label mereka.
Private label brands have been examined in the literature for more than forty years (Narasimhan and Wilcox, 1998). Due to the growth of private-label, researchers have looked into different influential factors to find out the reasons of the private label success. As consumers reflect the demand side of fast-moving goods, their perceptions affect decisions on brand selection and the performance.
Although the topic of private labels has long been studied, the volume of private-label research is less than that of national-brand. Findings from the extant studies of private labels have provided valuable consumer insights for marketing scholars and practitioners to better develop branding theory and strategies. However, issues still exist in the literature, in particular, concerning category-level influences of consumer factors such as perceived risk. Risk perception are important explanatory constructs for consumer proneness towards buying private labels. Category-level differences are stated as the most critical source that can explain the variations in the performance of private labels (Batra and Sinha, 2000; Dhar and Hoch, 1997).
This research replicates Batra and Sinha's (2000) study which examined the category-level effects of different determinants of perceived risk on consumer preferences for buying private labels. The purpose of this research is to re-examine their hypotheses.
A mall-intercept survey was conducted to test the hypotheses. The results indicate that perceived risk determinants such as consequences of making purchase mistake, quality variability, price consciousness influence significantly consumers' propensities to buy private labels. These private-label propensities vary across product categories due to category-level variations in perceptions and attitudes. Consumers are more likely to buy private labels in categories where they perceive lower quality variability across brands, where they have higher price consciousness, where they believe lower consequences of making purchase mistake.
Findings from this study suggest that category-level analysis of consumer factors could answer the question why private label success varies across different categories. A better way for national-brand manufacturers and retailers to compete against each other is product quality improvement. Manufacturers should try to keep the quality level of national brands as far above that of private labels, whereas retailers should attempt to reduce the quality gap for their private label brands.
Kata Kunci : private label brand, store brand, private brand, own-brand, national brand, retailer brand, merek toko, merek peritel, persepsi risiko, price consciousness.
