Does offering an organic food menu help restaurants excel in competition? An examination of diners’ decision-making

This study aims to examine whether the presence of an organic food menu can positively influence diners’ decision-making. A 3 (restaurant segment: quick service vs. casual dining vs. fine dining) by 2 (price discrepancy between competing restaurants: small vs. large) scenario-based experiment was conducted with 405 U.S. consumers. MANCOVA results indicate that using organic ingredients offers a greater advantage for the quick-service segment regarding perceived food quality, attitudes towards the restaurant, and willingness to select, compared to casual and fine dining segments. The magnitude of a premium price of organic ingredients negatively influences such advantage in the process of consumers’ decision-making. When a large (vs. small) premium price is charged for using organic ingredients, customers’ preferences for the restaurant (over its rival) significantly drops to such an extent that customers are more willing to choose the competitor (i.e., rival restaurant with a conventional menu). Discussions and implications are further elaborated.     

Willingness to pay in negative restaurant service encounters

The aim of this research is to propose and test a comprehensive research model to understand the influence of food quality, service quality, ambiance, and value on consumer WTP in negative service encounters. Using DINESERV as the theoretical background, a mixed methodology (ANOVA and structural equation modeling) was utilized for the study using a between-subjects experimental design. Data was collected using an online survey from students (Study 1) as well as restaurant consumers (Study 2). The structural equation modeling provided evidence for the arguments that food quality, ambiance, and value are significant predictors of customer WTP in a negative restaurant service encounter. Theoretical and managerial implications were discussed.     

Food safety in restaurants: The consumer perspective

The study aimed to reveal the indicators that consumers in Mainland China employ to evaluate food safety level of restaurants and find how the use of them varies across consumer subgroups. A national survey was carried out and 1076 respondents completed questionnaires which consisted of 33 questions. The results showed that the consumers preferred to assess a restaurant’s food safety level based on “sensory perception of food” and “restaurant environment”. Although official inspection certificate is one of the reliable indicators, the consumers seldom use it. Furthermore, consumers from different subgroups used different indicators. The females were much more finicky – they employed more indicators to protect them from unsafe restaurants. These results demonstrated a need for better education to create discerning consumers to expel those that fail to deliver safe food. Restaurants can rely on the results to develop effective marketing communication to match the consumers’ decision attributes.     

Restaurant consumers repeat patronage: A service quality concern

Consumer satisfaction can predict repeat patronage leading to brand loyalty and new consumers. Consumers determine which restaurants meet their quality standards and ignoring this leads to consumers moving toward competing restaurants. Expectations are important; unfulfilled expectations create consumers who may spread negative word-of-mouth. So achieving consumer satisfaction is realized through the delivery of exceptional value.     

A conflict of choice: How consumers choose where to go for dinner

Studies concerning consumers’ decision-making regarding a restaurant choice commonly cite food quality, service quality, and price as important determinants. Less research has focused on how consumers are willing to trade off gains and losses from respective foodservice attributes. Also, extant literature does not account for consumers who use a non-compensatory decision-making strategy. The present study examined consumers’ choices of casual restaurants using a simulation where trade-offs were inevitable. By utilizing a choice experiment, the researchers found that food quality is the most important attribute in restaurant choice, consistent with the literature reviewed. Good service quality, however, does not increase choice likelihood while poor service quality significantly reduces it. Most importantly, we determined a considerable percentage (24.57%) of respondents do not trade off food quality for better service or a lower price. Findings of the study are discussed with implications for practitioners.     

A Cross-cultural comparison of customer complaint behavior in restaurants in hotels

This study documented consumer complaint behavior in hotel restaurants in two diverse cosmopolitan cities, Hong Kong, SAR and Houston, USA. It was found that in the area of food and beverage attributes, the Hong Kong group rated tastiness, temperature and freshness less important to make a complaint about the Houston group. As for service, service efficiency, greetings, attentiveness and helpfulness were rated differently, with the Hong Kong group rated “greetings” higher than the Houston counterparts. Regarding atmospherics, the two groups were most alike, though the Hong Kong group would be more likely to complain about the noise level while the Houston group, temperature and décor of hotel restaurants.     

Dimensionality of ethnic food fine dining experience: An application of semantic network analysis

This study attempts to find the underlying dimensionality in online reviews of fine-dining ethnic food restaurant experiences in Hong Kong. This research adopted semantic network analysis with Clauset–Newman–Moore clustering. Consequently, diverse and specific dimensionality was explored in this research, including ambiance, service, food, drinks, desserts, view, location, occasions, reputation and price. The content of the reviews on five types of ethnic restaurants was different in some dimensions. Marketers of fine-dining ethnic restaurants can select a particular focus when they promote their restaurants, develop menu plan and train staff members. This study implies that the quality dimensions of traditional restaurants may not accurately represent the factual dimensions, thereby resulting in implications for developing a new index of restaurant quality.     

Effect of experiential value on customer satisfaction with service encounters in luxury-hotel restaurants

Exactly how the restaurant industry creates good quality service experiences has attracted the attention of scholars and practitioners. Some scholars advocate creating high quality service encounters to enhance customer satisfaction. However, recent research has not examined hotel restaurant service, and a detailed understanding of its potential effects on the customer meal experience and customer satisfaction is needed. Consequently, this study of service encounters and restaurant consumer behavior constructed a comprehensive framework via a literature review. Empirical data were collected by a questionnaire distributed to luxury-hotel restaurant customers. The empirical results indicated that restaurant environmental factors and interactions with service employees and other consumers positively influence the consumer experiential value. Additionally, only interactive relationships with service employees directly and positively affect consumer satisfaction. Restaurant environment factors and interactions with other consumers indirectly and positively influence consumer satisfaction through experiential value. Finally, with respect to marketing and development initiatives, the results of this study can help improve the physical attractiveness of the examined luxury-hotel restaurants.     

The effect of psychological empowerment climate on restaurant food safety,food quality,and financial performance

ABSTRACT

Consumer food safety incidences that result from employee accidents and behaviors can be detrimental and costly to a restaurant organization. Restaurant organizations and hospitality researchers have sought multiple methods of increasing food safety performance through training and intervention, but this study suggests that shared agreement of psychological empowerment may be a key factor in improving food safety performance, and in turn, food quality and store revenues. Using data from a national chain of quick service restaurants, this study used groups of restaurant employees’ psychological empowerment as an antecedent to food safety performance, measured in a food safety audit, and found significant support. Moreover, using consumer evaluations of food quality and the organization's store revenue records, indirect and direct relationships among psychological empowerment, food safety performance, food quality, and revenues were found. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.     

Perceptions of Chinese restaurants in the U.S.: What affects customer satisfaction and behavioral intentions?

This study investigates American customers’ perceptions of Chinese restaurants in the U.S., using the Importance–Performance Analysis (IPA) approach. This study also examines which attributes of Chinese restaurants influence American customers’ satisfaction and behavioral intentions. The IPA shows that environmental cleanliness and attentive service are two important areas where Chinese restaurateurs can make improvements. In addition, food taste and service reliability appear to be key attributes for Chinese restaurants’ success. Overall, this study indicates that food quality, service reliability and environmental cleanliness are three pivotal attributes to create satisfied customers and positive post-dining behavioral intentions. Chinese restaurant managers should reasonably allocate their limited resources to restaurant attributes based on their contributions to customer satisfaction and behavioral intentions.     

电子口碑对餐厅在线浏览量影响研究

Web 2.0技术和用户创造内容的发展改变了人们搜索和分享信息的方式,电子口碑作为传统口碑在互联网时代的发展产物,日渐成为消费者收集信息和进行决策的主要渠道。特别是近年来第三方点评网站数量不断增加,汇集了海量的信息,形成电子口碑效应,但是目前对这种效应的评价和测量研究不足。因此,文章借助第三方点评网站,研究消费者点评和编辑点评对餐厅网页浏览量的影响以及点评网上呈现餐厅的哪些口碑因素是吸引消费者浏览餐厅网页最重要的因素。研究发现,这两种形式的电子口碑对增加餐厅网页浏览量都具有显著的作用,编辑点评的重要性开始凸显,但消费者点评的作用更强。其中,点评数量是影响消费者浏览餐厅网页的最重要因素,其次是价格因素和消费者在餐厅网页上发布的图片。在餐厅体验的3个基本因素中,食物味道是影响餐厅网页浏览量最重要的因素。研究结果对第三方点评网站和旅游企业都具有重要的现实意义。     

A Text Mining and Multidimensional Sentiment Analysis of Online Restaurant Reviews

This study aims to identify the structure of online restaurant reviews and examine the influence of review attributes and sentiments on restaurant star ratings. While past research indicated four attributes specific to restaurant reviews—food, service, ambience, and price—this study proposes context as the fifth attribute unique to online reviews. Sentiment analysis of online restaurant reviews has confirmed the proposed underlying structure of online restaurant reviews. Results showed that consumers’ sentiments in these five attributes significantly explained the differences in star ratings. Food, service, and context are the top three attributes affecting star ratings, followed by price and ambiance.     

Price premiums for organic menus at restaurants: What is an acceptable level?

This study identifies acceptable premium price levels that customers would be willing to pay for organic menu items at restaurants in the United States. Previous literature indicates that health-related and socio-demographic characteristics significantly influence consumers’ intentions to purchase organic food. To advance our understanding of how different consumers respond to changes in organic food prices, this study examines the moderating effects of the level of health consciousness (high versus low), gender (male versus female), and age (young versus old) on the relationship between premium price levels and purchasing intentions. In addition, this study further investigates acceptable premium price levels for different consumer segments at two types of restaurants (casual dining versus fine dining). The results of this study provide guidelines for menu design and strategies for restaurateurs to devise effective price premiums for organic menu options.     

Luxury marketing: The influences of psychological and demographic characteristics on attitudes toward luxury restaurants

This study examined the influences of psychological characteristics (materialism, uniqueness, hedonism, and perfectionism), and demographic characteristics (gender, age, and income) on attitudes toward luxury restaurants. The results showed that consumers who desire materialism and hedonism had favorable attitudes toward luxury restaurants, whereas consumers who desire uniqueness had unfavorable attitudes toward luxury restaurants. Low income populations exhibited more unfavorable attitudes toward luxury restaurants than did middle and high income populations. Consumers who desire uniqueness weakly associate luxury restaurants with overall good service quality, whereas consumers who desire hedonism strongly associate luxury restaurants with overall good service quality.     

Differences in perceptions about food delivery apps between single-person and multi-person households

The growth in mobile communications is a significant reason attributed to the O2O commerce explosion in China. Mobile applications have seized this opportunity adapting it to restaurants and food delivery services, recognized as an alternative strategy to increase sales revenue and for consumers to conveniently receive products and services. This study was designed to specifically explore five salient quality attributes representing convenience, design, trustworthiness, price, and various food choices associated with food delivery apps in consideration of their impacts upon user-perceived value, attitudes and intention to continuously use. Results determined that user trustworthiness was the most important quality attribute of the food delivery app business. Additionally, this study found that single-person households placed most importance upon quality attributes for ‘various food choices,’ ‘price’ and ‘trustworthiness.’ Comparatively, multi-person households placed most importance upon ‘design,’ ‘convenience,’ and ‘trustworthiness.’ Managerial implications, limitations and recommendations for future research are provided.     

The impact of e-word-of-mouth on the online popularity of restaurants: A comparison of consumer reviews and editor reviews

With the growing availability and popularity of web-based opinion platforms, online product reviews are now an emerging market phenomenon that is playing an increasingly important role in consumer purchase decisions. Generally speaking, there are two types of online reviews: consumer-generated reviews that are based on personal experiences, and reviews that are written by professional editors. However, little prior research efforts have been devoted to evaluate whether these two types of reviews have different influences on the behavior of online users. This study shows that consumer-generated ratings about the quality of food, environment and service of restaurants, and the volume of online consumer reviews are positively associated with the online popularity of restaurants; whereas editor reviews have a negative relationship with consumers’ intention to visit a restaurant's webpage. The findings will help hospitality researchers and practitioners better understand the impact of electronic word-of-mouth on purchase decisions.     

Factors Influencing Restaurant Selection by Travelers Who Stop at Visitor Information Centers

This article reports the findings of an exploratory study defining expectations for restaurants of travelers who stop at visitor information centers. Using data collected from 2, 712 summer travelers, four factors that explain consumer expectations are discussed: information, restaurant basics, amenities, and health. Travelers rated attributes such as cleanliness, food quality, and friendliness of staff as most important. Suggestions are given for developing promotional materials for attracting travelers to restaurants.     

Self-service technology kiosk design for restaurants: An QFD application

Self-service technology (SST) has been increasingly integrated into today’s service industry. The ability to understand how customers perceive SST and improve its quality is therefore important for both researchers and practitioners. Applying the Quality Function Deployment (QFD) methodology, this research established an SST House of Quality (HoQ) structure for restaurants by synthesizing the inputs of consumers and restaurant industry experts, the managers. This HoQ presents a relationship matrix that allows restaurants to assess SST attributes in relation to SST technical design specificities in a measurable way. Such a relationship matrix can assist in designing restaurant SST to deliver better service and customer experiences. This research thus provides an illustration of how the QFD method can be a useful tool in SST service design in restaurants.     

Language representation of restaurants: Implications for developing online recommender systems

As a marketing tool recommender systems have the potential to provide relevant and highly personalized information to consumers. However, developing effective recommender systems requires a substantive understanding of consumers’ preferences as well as meaningful ways to represent hospitality and travel products. This paper argues that language holds the key to understanding consumer preferences and therefore developing effective online recommender systems. Specifically, it explores the nature of the language used by consumers to describe their dining experiences in contrast to the language used by restaurant websites. The findings indicate that consumers use substantially different vocabularies from restaurant websites to describe dining experiences. This study provides implications for developing online recommender systems for restaurants as well as general hospitality and travel products.