MKT 554 Week 1 Buyer Behavior Theories and Consumer Preference Example

Why Parents Choose the Middle Trumpet: Applying Buyer Behavior Theories to Consumer Preference at a Texas Music Retailer

[Student Name]

University of Phoenix

MKT/554: Consumer Behavior

Week 1 Assignment

[Instructor Name]

[Date]

Harmon and Vale Music, its stores, prices and sales figures are composites written for a model paper.

Harmon and Vale Music is a composite chain of 11 stores in Austin, San Antonio and the Houston suburbs, founded in 1979. It earns about $48 million a year from three lines of business: rental and sale of band and orchestra instruments to families of students in school music programs, about 55 percent of revenue; sales of pianos and keyboards, about 25 percent; and guitars, accessories and lessons, about 20 percent. Every August, thousands of parents visit its stores or its school-night rental events to rent an instrument for a child starting band. A review of three years of rental contracts revealed a pattern that surprised the marketing director, Camila Reyes. Among beginner trumpets, offered at three levels priced at $24, $32 and $45 a month on a rent-to-own plan, 61 percent of families chose the middle option, whatever the brand. When the chain added a $58 premium model two years ago, the share choosing the $45 model rose from 19 to 31 percent, though only 4 percent chose the new premium horn. This paper applies buyer behavior theories to explain those choices and recommends how the chain should present its products.

The Traditional Decision Model

The classic model of consumer decision making describes five stages: problem recognition, information search, evaluation of alternatives, purchase and postpurchase evaluation. It assumes that consumers know what they want, gather information about attributes, weigh the alternatives and choose the option with the highest overall value. The model fits high-involvement purchases made by informed buyers reasonably well.

Where the Model Fits Harmon and Vale's Customers

Some customers follow the model closely. Adults buying a grand piano typically visit several stores over weeks, read reviews, play instruments and compare tone, action and resale value. Their preferences are formed before the final choice, and salespeople mostly answer questions. For these buyers, the chain's strengths, its selection, its technicians and its trade-in program, matter at the evaluation stage.

Where It Breaks Down

Most band parents behave differently. Problem recognition is sudden, triggered by a letter from the school band director in late July. Search is short; many parents arrive at a school rental night with a list from the director and 20 minutes to decide. Few can judge a trumpet's quality. They cannot weigh attributes they do not understand, so the evaluation stage, as the model describes it, barely happens.

Preferences Built in the Store

Bettman et al. (1998) reviewed research showing that consumers often construct preferences at the moment of choice rather than retrieving them from memory. When people lack stable preferences or the ability to judge options, they rely on strategies that depend on the task: the number of options, how information is displayed and which comparisons are easy. Choices therefore change with context. This theory fits band parents well. They arrive without a preference about brass weight or valve material and build one from the rental board in front of them.

The Compromise Effect

Simonson (1989) showed in a series of experiments that when one option sits between a cheaper, lower-quality option and a more expensive, higher-quality one, its share of choices rises. He explained that the middle option is easiest to justify to oneself and others: it avoids both the risk of poor quality and the risk of overspending. Parents choosing a trumpet for an 11-year-old who may quit after a year face exactly that tension. The middle option, at $32 a month, lets them avoid looking careless or extravagant. Parents are not choosing the best trumpet; they are choosing the most defensible one.

The Attraction Effect

Huber et al. (1982) found that adding an option that is clearly worse than one existing option but not another can increase the share of the option it makes look better, a pattern known as the attraction or decoy effect. The $58 premium model at Harmon and Vale worked in a related way. By making the $45 model look like a moderate choice rather than the most expensive one, it moved some families up a level, consistent with the broader finding that the set of options shapes which one looks reasonable.

Too Many Options

In guitars, the opposite problem appears. The chain's stores display between 140 and 220 guitars. Sales records show that first-time adult guitar buyers who visit the larger stores leave without buying more often than those who visit smaller ones. Iyengar and Lepper (2000) found in field and laboratory studies that people offered a large assortment of jams or chocolates were less likely to buy and less satisfied with their choices than those offered a small assortment. Novices facing a wall of guitars may experience the same overload, although later research has shown that the effect varies, and experienced players clearly value the selection.

Comparing the Theories

The traditional model explains the piano buyers. Constructive choice explains why band parents' preferences depend on the lineup. The compromise and attraction effects explain the specific pattern in trumpet rentals. Choice overload helps explain lost guitar sales among novices. No single theory explains all three customer groups, which suggests that the chain should design its selling environment differently for each.

Evidence From the Piano Floor

The piano records offer a useful contrast. When the chain added a higher-priced digital piano to its lineup, the share of buyers choosing the next model down did not change, and most buyers chose the same models they had asked about by name when they arrived. These are buyers whose preferences were formed before the visit, which is what the traditional model predicts. The contrast suggests that context effects are strongest where buyers lack knowledge and time, and weakest where they have both.

Ethical Considerations

Context effects can be used to steer buyers toward higher-margin products they do not need. For band families, many with limited budgets, Harmon and Vale should use what it knows about choice to help parents make sound decisions, not to inflate rentals. Steering a family toward a $58 trumpet for a beginner who may quit within a year would damage trust with parents and band directors, the chain's most important referral source.

Managerial Recommendations

First, keep three clearly differentiated beginner options for each instrument, with plain explanations of who each is for, and make the middle option the one band directors actually recommend, so the compromise effect leads families to a sound choice. Second, remove the premium beginner models, which add little revenue and some confusion, and instead offer an upgrade path after the first year. Third, for first-time guitar buyers, create a beginner corner with eight carefully chosen guitars and a short guide, while keeping the full wall for experienced players. Fourth, train school-night staff to ask two questions, the child's commitment and the family's budget, before showing options.

Conclusion

Buyer behavior theories differ in how much they assume consumers know before they choose. The traditional decision model fits Harmon and Vale's informed piano buyers, while research on constructed preferences, context effects and choice overload explains how band parents and novice guitar buyers form preferences in the store. Presenting fewer, clearer options and recommending honestly will serve those customers and the chain's long-term reputation.

References

Bettman, J. R., Luce, M. F., & Payne, J. W. (1998). Constructive consumer choice processes. Journal of Consumer Research, 25(3), 187-217. https://doi.org/10.1086/209535

Huber, J., Payne, J. W., & Puto, C. (1982). Adding asymmetrically dominated alternatives: Violations of regularity and the similarity hypothesis. Journal of Consumer Research, 9(1), 90-98. https://doi.org/10.1086/208899

Iyengar, S. S., & Lepper, M. R. (2000). When choice is demotivating: Can one desire too much of a good thing? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 79(6), 995-1006. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.79.6.995

Simonson, I. (1989). Choice based on reasons: The case of attraction and compromise effects. Journal of Consumer Research, 16(2), 158-174. https://doi.org/10.1086/209205