A Causal Study on the Antecedents of Retail Shoppers’ Repatronage Intention

Abstract

This study has investigated the impact of few important antecedents (such as perceived service quality, perceived product quality, store assortment, price perception, trust, and commitment) of shoppers’ satisfaction and how these antecedents as mediated through shoppers’ satisfaction affect shoppers’ repatronage intention. A multi-item structured questionnaire was used to collect data from 210 shoppers of a major retail chain operating in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Validity and reliability of each construct were assessed by employing Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) using AMOS and the results were satisfactory. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was performed to assess the data-model fit and examine the causal paths to test the proposed hypotheses. Out of seven hypotheses, five hypotheses were supported empirically as per SEM results. Perceived product quality, price perception, perceived service quality, and product assortment came out to be the strong antecedents of shoppers’ satisfaction with high statistical significance. Furthermore, shoppers’ satisfaction demonstrated the most powerful impact on shoppers’ repatronage intention. Thus, the fifth hypothesis was supported.  This study might encourage the retail operators to identify the needful to make the shoppers to become steady patrons of their stores.

Key Words: Perceived Service Quality, Perceived Product Quality, Store Assortment, Price Perception, Trust, Commitment, Customer Satisfaction, and Repatronage Intention.