Customer Satisfaction within the Purchasing Process - A case study for the retailer IKEA

Abstract

Many retailers have moved toward strategies that use large assortments and/or customization in order to establish a competitive advantage. Large assortment strategies used by category killers can however backfire if the complexity causes information overload that aggravate customers’ purchasing decision process. In order to facilitate the purchasing process for customers, retailers can adopt a self-service strategy. This will enable customers to manage their decision-making easier without any help from personnel. Further, retailer can thereby achieve a high level of customer satisfaction at the same time as keeping costs down. However, if a department store uses a self-service strategy, the system needs to function smoothly or the store runs the risk of loosing potential customers. This study investigates three studios at IKEA’s two department stores in Gothenburg. It examines the customer satisfaction as well as functionality of the purchasing process within these studios. Earlier results from customer satisfaction surveys at IKEA reveal that customers are not completely satisfied with the purchasing process with regards to the complex product assortments. The customer satisfaction and experience of customers’ purchasing process was mainly investigated through interviews. The statistical results in this study indicate that the customer satisfaction and functionality of the purchasing process differ between the studios. Customers are overall satisfied with the studios, but there are some suggestions given in this thesis that IKEA should consider in order to increase customers’ satisfaction and improve the purchasing process.