An Assessment of Consumer Satisfaction for Food Retail Chains: A Case Study from Turkey

Consumer oriented marketing concept appeared to be effective in accordance to the shift from the traditional marketing approach to the modern marketing approach. This process brings about the concept of customer value in retail food sector as it is the case in other sectors. The rise in number and variety of shopping units that operate in the retail market drives firms into value based marketing concept. Due to the positive effect on the relationship between customer value and customer satisfaction, measuring customer satisfaction in order to increase customer value in sector has gained importance. This study is focuses on determination of satisfaction level of customers who make shopping in local and national supermarket chains operating in retail food sector. In order to achieve this, firstly the qualifications that constitute customer satisfaction conditions in supermarket chains and satisfaction level of customers regarding those qualifications are determined. The study was conducted in Antalya province of Turkey. The sample size was determined as 400 with 95 % confidence interval and 5 % margin of error. The data were collected from consumers via face to face survey. In the study 30 basic qualifications affecting performance of supermarket chains on customer satisfaction were enlisted under five main factors. Customer satisfaction index of supermarket chains was found out to be 74, 9 %, which is 72, 8 % in local chains and higher with 77, 8 % in national chains. Findings reveal that local supermarket chains focus on positioning strategy while national supermarket chains focus on good/service strategies. However, the lowest satisfaction level criterion of customers in food purchases in retail chains was found out to be related with after sales service process.