What are the key motivators that influence consumers to use food delivery systems?

Abstract

The aim of the research is to “critically evaluate consumer’s motivation toward the use of food delivery systems” and the researcher has collected both secondary and primary data for this dissertation.

The wide-ranging literature review commences with an evaluation of general consumer motivations and then reviews research by Blesic et al. (2014) who analysed quality, hygiene, convenience, nearness and accessibility in fast food purchasing as motivators. In addition, McKinsey (2016) considered consumers' key motivations around the variety of food offered and convenience. Lastly, Yeo et al. (2017) who determined that the key factors in consumers' use of food delivery systems are: time saving, money saving, prior experience and convenience.

The literature review identified that there is an apparent disconnect between theories relating to the motivators for general hospitality purchasing and food delivery services. This research collected primary data in order to investigate and analyse these differences in order to help fill the gaps in the existing body of research relating to food delivery services in particular.

The primary data collection took a deductive ontological approach through online quantitative data collection. Due to limitations of time and resources, convenience non probability sampling was deemed to be appropriate. After data cleansing, there were 98 valid responses with a clear bias toward females and the 18-25 age demographic. The

data set was analysed using SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences). Tests included standard deviation, correlation, mean and Pearson Chi-square to both understand the data and to improve validity of results.

The key findings of the research are that trust in online retailers is paramount if consumers are to buy food for online delivery and that quality was the main determinant for consumer purchasing. This is in contradiction to the broad tenet of the literature where the key motivator is identified as convenience.

This work helps address a gap in published research relating to consumers’ motivations in regard to use of online platforms for food delivery which is important as, at the time of writing, there is an oversupply of restaurants in the marketplace and diversification into online delivery may be an increasingly vital part of the sales mix.