Determinants of Customers' Propensity to Plan Purchases during Sales: the Role of Customer Knowledge

In this paper we address the limited understanding of how the amount of sales used by retailers changes the customers’ propensity to plan purchases. We investigate the effects of shopping motivation, buying behavior, marketing skepticism, and marketing literacy on the propensity to plan purchases by customers and how they comply with this purchase plan. A classification of sales into short-, missile- and long-run is developed. Based on in-depth interviews and an online survey we identify the abovementioned factors perform differently depending on sales types. Overall, utilitarian shopping motivation that positively affects shopping planning and compliance with the shopping plan during sales, and sales buyers experience more hedonic value and have a higher level of marketing literacy at sales than non-buyers. It was also found that the less often the sale is held, the more unplanned purchases buyers make. During regular sales, buyers show a lower level of marketing skepticism that those who do not buy.