A market research study on impact of Covid-19 on packaging of food products and how it will influence consumer’s purchase decision

Abstract

Packaging is a key component in promoting products and helps brand to differentiate itself – specially in today’s world. After the pandemic, consumers are more concerned about the safety and hygiene, hence this will bring in a significant change in the packaging of consumer goods. Companies will have to re-think packaging beyond must-haves with improved design keeping safety concerns, ship ready or direct-to-consumer models in mind along with sustainability. This study aims to understand how Covid 19 has impacted the packaging of consumer products due to fundamental shift in the buying behaviour of the consumers. Also, how this has influenced the consumers purchase decision. Inputs from the qualitative research were used to develop multiple hypotheses, in which all three of them we descriptive in nature, making it a descriptive study. Around 100 samples were collected for the descriptive study through questionnaires. After cleaning the collected data, multiple data analysis techniques like correlation, regression, mediation analysis used to test the hypothesis. Based on our survey and experiment, we analysed the focus areas for packaging of food products. Firstly, from our regression analysis, we observed that both sterilised packaging & eco-friendly packaging do positively influence the purchase intention of the consumers. Hence, the companies should focus on targeted advertisements whereby they highlight the positive impact of such packaging. This will help the management of the companies to increase the brand recall value and thus leading to repeat purchases and loyal consumers. The management of the companies can use traditional as well as digital marketing. Secondly, they can also advertise the food packaging of products on e-commerce websites like Zomato & Swiggy through headers or banners on their landing page which will be an easy navigation for consumers thus making their journey simple. Finally, through the experiment, we analysed that the consumers desirability level of such packaging should be increased as there is lack of awareness in the minds of consumers. They need to be educated about the benefits of such packaging in terms of safety, hygiene, positive environmental impact. This can be done through influencer marketing or social media marketing. Finally, we analysed the potential limitations of our study and stated in below.