What is Impulsive Buying?

Introduction:

In impulse buying a product is purchased spontaneously which is unplanned it could be anything,; a service, existing and new products to which the consumers are generally attracted because of various factors. Barratt, Rook 1987 stated that consumer gets attracted towards a product to buy it without considering its consequences of delaying a product to fill a pre-determined need.

It is very much possible that consumer may experience positive and negative consequences of a product bought through impulsive buying after its post purchase evaluation.

There are many researchers who have worked extensively on this topic and come up with more or less same definition and amplification of impulse buying.

According to Cobb & Hoyer 1986; Piron, 1991; Rook, 1987; Rook & Fischer, 1995; Weinberg & Gottwold, 1982; searched and wrote that the urge of buying a product is of that the product is calling them to buy it, ultimately this urge leads them to purchase the product and some researchers stated that the urge of buying products are very dominant and powerful that the consumer cannot resist them.

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In Pakistan the number of retail outlets, shopping malls and super stores are increasing rapidly as compared to traditionally open bazar. This includes places likes Metro Cash N Carry, Hyper Star, Pace, Makro and Suburban etc.

These are a few of the prominent shopping malls in Pakistan with many outlets. The factors behind the success of these stores is their layout of well managed hassle free environment, availability and placement for fresh and hygienic vegetables, meat and fish which gets the attention and appreciation of consumers moreover the high-level of service and the behavior of sales staff make the visit of the consumers more comfortable and valuable especially for the working class who have minimum time for shopping.

Attributes or characteristics of impulse buying behavior of consumer:

• The tempting and overwhelming force emerging from the product which produces feelings in consumer heart.
• Urge of buying a product immediately.
• Delaying the purchase of needed product.
• Ignoring the consequences of product purchased through impulse buying.
• Feeling of desperation in terms of buying a product.

Literature Review:

From the start of 1950's till today a lot of research has been done on this topic in this long span of time many researchers who have conducted research on this always come up with very interesting findings or results. Recently many researchers have moved their area of focus from western to Asian countries and are investigating the buying patrons of the people living in Asia. Many of them have identified and observed some common variables according to a researcher (Beatty & Farrell, 1998).

The ratio and chances of impulse buying increases with the passage of time. He or She spends more time in the store than before, the more they spend time on shopping and browsing upon different product the more it with increase the chance of impulse buying. Some researchers have also stated that the impulse buying is relatively more common in females as compared to males (Giraud, 2001).

According to a researcher (Giraud, 2001) finds that the mood of the consumer also affects impulse buying behavior which means that when the customer is in a good mood, he or she will embark themselves with the products which fall in the category of impulse buying and if he or she is in bad mood the person will tend to reward his or herself less. (Maiet Al, 2001) Stated that the spending on impulse buying is done more by young generation and usually the age segment falls in the range of 18-40 years old. (Rook, 1987.) Stated that the urge and temptations of buying a particular product is so strong that a person can postpone the purchase of a well needed product which solves their existing problem.

The Importance and concept of store layout can never be bypassed by the true marketers and operational managers because the store layout influences the buying behavior of the consumer for example IKEA, LEGO and Zara Men etc are the famous brands which focuses heavily on store layout of a retail store. (Crawford & Melewar, 2003) stated that the true marketers should work on store layout and should provide a good layout to provide an ease of shopping to the consumer.

A good standard and effective store layout let alone achieve the goal of providing convenience to the customer the role of good and trained sales person is also very important. According to (Crawford & Melewar, 2003) an interaction with a well trained sales person can trigger impulse buying behavior of consumer it also reduces the tension of customer by guiding them.

One study conducted by (Wang and Zhou, 2003) shows that promotional activities show increases impulse buying by consumer when there are sales or discounts on products. according to researchers (dholakia,2000:rook 1987) when a consumer see promotional incentives on some products this things affects the impulse buying of him or her. Factors affectingaffectig impulse buying:

The followingfollowig are the factors which affects impulse buying behavior of consumer:

• Promotional activities
• Income
• Presence of others
• Store layout
• Sales person

Promotional Activities:

The word promotion in terms of marketing means by using different strategies marketers can influence the buying behaviorbehaviour of consumerconumer to buy a product to increase sales of the company.

This could be achieved by sales discount, advertisement and free product. It is a human psychepsychy when evere they see a free product or discount they tend to buy to take advantage of this despite of affect they in actual did not need that product. Janakiraman Eded al, 2006 stated that willingness to buy the unneeded and unrelated commoditycomodity increases the chances of the impulse buying because of unexpected price discounts.

Income:

The income level influence and affect the impulse buying pattern of consumer greatly. The more a person is getting inco0me the more he will do impulse buying. In good economic conditions, the income levels of people go high, many economists and researchers have reported the increase in sales of products which also includes the purchase of products done thought impulsive buying.

Presence of others:

Store layout:

Sales person:

The interaction between consumers and sales person is of very prime importance. A good competent salesperson could influence the consumer to buy product impulsively.

Objective of the study:

As we have told you earlier in this research paper that many researchers have conducted research on this topic especially in developed countries like England, Norway, Canada, America etc. Now the researchers and analyst areAnd also conducting research in developing countries like Pakistan, India, Indonesia, Poland, Bangladesh, and Thailand etc. Our objective of the study is to find out the factors effecting consumer impulse buying behavior in Pakistan.

Theoretical framework: in this research paper we have taken impulse buying as dependent variable and sales force, promotional activities , income , store layout and presence of others as independent variables and formed several hypothesis which are given below:

H1: There is a positive relationship between promotional activities and impulse buying.

H2: There is a positive relationship between income level and impulse buying.

H3: There is a positive relationship between store layout and impulse buying.

H4: There is a positive relationship between sales force behavior and impulse buying.

H5: There is a positive relationship between presence of others and impulse buying.