Reflection: Week 4

This week's blog post will only incorporate one day of class; however, that one day of class consisted of important discussions about the consumer decision making process. In class on Tuesday, we were given the opportunity to evaluate or blog posts from last week. In doing so, I realized that I incorrectly identified two types of products. I want to begin this week's blog post by correcting my mistake:

Brand Loyal (Habit) Behavior vs. Routine Response Behavior

The main difference between these two terms is the amount of risk the consumer associates with each product. Consumers who display brand loyal buying behavior assume a low risk with the product they are buying because they took an extensive amount of time to determine that is the brand they would like to buy. So, when the consumer initially started buying that product they associated it with a high risk, which is why they conducted extensive research. This is an experience I had with Quaker Oats Oatmeal,  for example. A consumer exercises routine response behavior, however, when they put little time into deciding what brand to buy because they identify the product as having low risk. To name an example, this is how I feel about shaving cream. Every brand gets the job done and I never spend much time deciding which kind to buy because price is the most important factor. Additionally, I do not regularly buy the same brand because I see little difference between all brands.


I would like to dedicate the next section of this blog post to discuss the assignment we were given at the end of Tuesday's class. Before watching a Shark Tank video about a product named "Bambooee", we each picked a market segment out of a hat. Our assignment was to create a print advertisement that met the needs and interests of out market segment. The market segment I worked with is:

Kid Country, USA

Despite what the name implies, this market segment consists of people who are most likely age 25-44, live in towns, have earned a college education, are of midscale income, and have kids. These families most likely enjoy outdoor activities and own a boat or an ATV, according to the website CLARATIS.

When conducting research for this assignment, I identified people ages 25-44 as part of "Generation X". Our textbook claims that people of Generation X are the best educated generation with 29% of them earning a bachelor's degree or better. Gen Xs tend to be disloyal to brands and skeptical of bug business. Furthermore, they desire an experience, not just a product. Perhaps this is why they are likely to own a boar or an ATV. Lastly, this market segment is not found near Western New England University, nor is it found in my home town of Belchertown, Massachusetts.

In my print advertisement, I decided to emphasize that Bambooee is more than a product and that it provides a unique cleaning experience. I included, but did not focus on, how eco-friendly the product was because I figured that my consumer would be educated enough to know that a machine wash and dry product would be more environmentally friendly than regular paper towels. I included a caption that read "ditch your name brand for Bambooee" because Kid Country consumers are disloyal to brands.


I want to reserve the last section of my blog to discuss the work team Hot Wheelz has completed on the "Smart Project" this week:

Heated Steering Wheel: Update

This week I learned what a product screening matrix is, and I am fascinated by the concept. Normally, when a business student thinks about the best possible version of a product, the first thing that comes to mind is aesthetics. A product screening matrix teaches you that the product that has the overall best functionality will prevail over products that only consider aesthetics. Perhaps this is an easy concept that I should have considered before this week, but learning about a product screening matrix made me think about the heated steering wheel in a different way than ever before.

Second, our team began revisions of the team memo that we turned in last week. From the comments left on the memo, it is obvious that we missed what social trends make this "bug" relevant. Along with trends, we are including several new criteria and restraints based on the feedback from our classmates last week. For example, a very obvious constraint that we missed the first time is the limited availability of every group member.