Regular or low-fat? An investigation of the long-run impact of the first low-fat purchase on subsequent purchase volumes and calories

Kathleen Cleeren, Kelly Geyskens, Peter C. Verhoef and Joost M.E. Pennings

International Journal of Research in Marketing, 2016, vol. 33, issue 4, 896-906

Abstract: Health organizations stimulate the development of low-fat variants to fight the obesity epidemic. We examine the effectiveness of this policy by studying the short- and long-term consequences of the first low-fat purchase on subsequent purchased volume and calories. Using a structural break analysis, we show that purchases increase in the short run after the first low-fat purchase, thereby confirming the single-occasion overconsumption effect of low-fat as shown in the experimental literature. Importantly, our results also show a significant positive long-term effect, which suggests that overpurchasing persists in the long run. In addition, our findings show that the long-term overpurchasing after the first low-fat purchase is solely due to the overpurchasing of low-fat items and not of regular items. These results provide support for the overgeneralization of claim effects and habit formation resulting in the enduring effect of healthier variants of unhealthy food.

Keywords: Low-fat; Overpurchasing; Household panel data; Long-run impact; Structural break analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167811616300489
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ijrema:v:33:y:2016:i:4:p:896-906

DOI: 10.1016/j.ijresmar.2016.04.001

Access Statistics for this article

International Journal of Research in Marketing is currently edited by Roland Rust

More articles in International Journal of Research in Marketing from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().