VALS ("Values, Attitudes and Lifestyles") is a proprietary research methodology used

for psychographic market segmentation. Market segmentation is designed to guide companies in tailoring

their products and services to appeal to the people most likely to purchase them.

VALS was developed in 1978 by social scientist and consumer futurist Arnold Mitchell and his colleagues

at SRI International. It was immediately embraced by advertising agencies, and is currently offered as a

product of SRI's consulting services division. VALS draws heavily on the work of Harvard

sociologist David Riesman and psychologist Abraham Maslow. [1]

Mitchell used statistics to identify attitudinal and demographic questions that helped categorize adult

American consumers into one of nine lifestyle types: survivors (4%), sustainers (7%), belongers (35%),

emulators (9%), achievers (22%), I-am-me (5%), experiential (7%), societally conscious (9%), and

integrated (2%). The questions were weighted using data developed from a sample of 1,635 Americans

and their partners, who responded to an SRI International survey in 1980. [2]

The main dimensions of the VALS framework are primary motivation (the horizontal dimension) and

resources (the vertical dimension). The vertical dimension segments people based on the degree to

which they are innovative and have resources such as income, education, self-confidence, intelligence,

leadership skills, and energy. The horizontal dimension represents primary motivations and includes three

distinct types:

Consumers driven by knowledge and principles are motivated primarily by ideals. These consumers

include groups called Thinkers and Believers.

Consumers driven by demonstrating success to their peers are motivated primarily by achievement.

These consumers include groups referred to as Achievers and Strivers.

Consumers driven by a desire for social or physical activity, variety, and risk taking are motivated

primarily by self-expression. These consumers include the groups known as Experiencers and

Makers.

VALS Framework and Segment

Innovator. These consumers are on the leading edge of change, have the highest incomes, and

such high self-esteem and abundant resources that they can induldge in any or all self-orientations.

They are located above the rectangle. Image is important to them as an expression of

taste, independence, and character. Their consumer choices are directed toward the "finer things in

life."

Thinkers. These consumers are the high-resource group of those who are motivated by ideals. They

are mature, responsible, well-educated professionals. Their leisure activities center on their homes,

but they are well informed about what goes on in the world and are open to new ideas and social

change. They have high incomes but are practical consumers and rational decision makers.

Believers. These consumers are the low-resource group of those who are motivated by ideals. They

are conservative and predictable consumers who favor American products and established brands.

Their lives are centered on family, community, and the nation. They have modest incomes.

Achievers. These consumers are the high-resource group of those who are motivated by

achievement. They are successful work-oriented people who get their satisfaction from their jobs and

families. They are politically conservative and respect authority and the status quo. They favor

established products and services that show off their success to their peers.

Strivers. These consumers are the low-resource group of those who are motivated by achievements.

They have values very similar to achievers but have fewer economic, social, and psychological

resources. Style is extremely important to them as they strive to emulate people they admire.

Experiencers. These consumers are the high-resource group of those who are motivated by self-

expression. They are the youngest of all the segments, with a median age of 25. They have a lot of

energy, which they pour into physical exercise and social activities. They are avid consumers,

spending heavily on clothing, fast-foods, music, and other youthful favorites, with particular emphasis

on new products and services.

Makers. These consumers are the low-resource group of those who are motivated by self-

expression. They are practical people who value self-sufficiency. They are focused on the familiar-

family, work, and physical recreation-and have little interest in the broader world. As consumers, they

appreciate practical and functional products.

Survivors. These consumers have the lowest incomes. They have too few resources to be included

in any consumer self-orientation and are thus located below the rectangle. They are the oldest of all

the segments, with a median age of 61. Within their limited means, they tend to be brand-loyal

consumers.

External Influences on Consumer Behavior

External influences include culture, socioeconomic level, reference groups,

and household.

CULTURE. Culture is defined as the patterns of behavior and social relations

that characterize a society and separate it from others. Culture conveys values,

ideals, and attitudes that help individuals communicate with each other

and evaluate situations. It is important in viewing culture to draw legitimate

generalizations about a given culture or subculture without resorting to stereotyping.

An individual’s culture provides a frame of reference concerning acceptable

behaviors, and as such, culture is a learned set of arbitrary values.

The dominant culture in the United States today stresses equality, use of resources,

materialism, individualism, and youth.

Difference in culture is most apparent when a hospitality and tourism firm

attempts to expand into international markets. There are significant differences

between, for example, the way that Europeans make purchase decisions

and exhibit travel behavior and the way that Americans do so. For example,

in much of Europe, it is very common for a family to take an extended vacation

that might last for two, three, or more weeks. In France, it is very common

for businesses to shut down for much of August while the entire country

is on vacation. In the United States, the opposite trend is prevalent. Families

are less likely to take a vacation of more than one week and are more likely

to take a series of mini vacations that extend over three-day weekends. In fact,

in the early 1990s, Stouffer Renaissance Hotels went so far as to trademark

the phrase “break-ation” to use in their promotion and advertising to describe

the mini or getaway vacations that have become common in the United States.

In addition to the general culture of the United States, marketers must

also be concerned with subcultures. Subcultures might include African Americans,

Jews, Hispanics, Asians, and youths.

One example illustrates the importance of subcultures in marketing. Although

families are one of the major markets for fast-food chains, and parents

pay the bills for the family, much of the advertising for these chains is

directed toward the youth subculture. Research has shown that it is often the

children who influence the decision on where to dine, once the adults have

decided to dine out.

SOCIOECONOMIC LEVEL. Socioeconomic level has a large influence in

consumer decision making. Marketing managers have long attempted to correlate

socioeconomic level with dining-out habits and travel patterns. Hospitality

managers must identify the relative socioeconomic levels to which the

operation appeals and appeal directly to those groups with the marketing mix

that they use. For example, an upscale and expensive four- or five-star resort

property will target its promotional efforts to those in upper income groups.

These resorts are likely to advertise in publications read by professionals and

those who are in the top 25 percent of annual household income. That is their

target market.

 Posted: 3-17-2009 23:17 | All replies by this member

Hospitality managers often strive to create their own reference groups and

opinion leaders. Frequent guests can be rewarded with complimentary samples

of new menu items or perhaps a complimentary flavored coffee or bottle

of champagne. The champagne creates excitement and is very likely to

increase sales, as individuals sitting at other tables want to become part of the

excitement and often order a bottle for their own table. The desired result is

of course a snowball effect among many tables, which results in increased

sales. Frequent guests can also be used for feedback about potential new menu

items or new services. If they are favorably impressed with the new products

or services, they will tell their friends and colleagues, and increased business

can result.

HOUSEHOLD. A household is defined as those individuals who occupy a

single living unit. There are more than 80 million households in the United

States, and within every household certain characteristics, leadership, and

norms exist. Leadership is normally rotated among members of the household.

For example, the children may decide which breakfast cereal to eat or

which fast-food restaurant to patronize, while an adult selects the type of

living accommodations. Hospitality marketing research points out that leadership

is often shared. For example, the parents normally decide when the

household will go out to eat, but it is the children who decide which restaurant

will be patronized.

All external influences discussed can affect the decision-making process

of a consumer whenever a decision about hospitality and tourism products

and services is made. The culture, socioeconomic level, reference groups, and

household members influence directly and indirectly, consciously and unconsciously,

the dining habits of all consumers.

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Internal Influences on Consumer Behavior

In addition to external influences, internal influences affect consumers’ choices

as well—personal needs and motives, experience, personality and self-image,

and perceptions and attitudes. The exact influence of internal factors is less

well known than the external factors, as internal factors are not as observable

and therefore are not as well documented and understood.

PERSONAL NEEDS AND MOTIVES. A need is defined as a lack of something

or the difference between someone’s desired and actual states. Motive

is defined as a person’s inner state that directs the individual toward satisfying

a felt need. For example, consumers may be hungry and tired (their actual

state), yet they desire to be well fed and rested (desired state). This felt

need would, therefore, cause them to have the motivation to seek out a restaurant

where this need could be satisfied.

figure 3.1 • Needs related to consumer behavior.

 

Despite years of consumer behavior research, it is very difficult, if not impossible,

to fully explain all of the needs consumers feel. Figure 3.1 illustrates

the role of needs in consumer behavior. Simply stated, needs lead to motivation,

which leads to behavioral intentions, which ultimately lead to observable

behavior. Following behavior, feedback affects and may change a consumer’s

motivation. To continue our earlier example, once the consumer had been to

a particular restaurant, if the meal was satisfying and met prior expectations,

then the feedback would be favorable and the consumer would likely plan to

return to this particular restaurant. If, however, the meal was not satisfying

or did not meet prior expectations, then the individual’s negative feelings

would likely result in not returning to this particular restaurant. It is important

to remember that successful marketing is about identifying and then

meeting or exceeding the expectations of consumers.

In the mid-1900s, Abraham Maslow, an American psychologist, developed

a model identifying five classes of needs; today the model remains one

of the influential cornerstones of consumer behavior. As shown in Figure 3.2,

Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is arranged in the following order, from the lowest

to highest level: physiological needs, safety needs, social and belonging

needs, esteem needs, and self-actualization needs.2 Individuals are believed to

satisfy the lower-level needs before they move to the higher-level needs.

. Consumer behavior has changed dramatically in the past decade. 

2. For example, the use of the Internet has allowed consumers to order online, receive information without leaving their homes, and sell products without

advertising in the local newspaper.

3. All of these new ways of selling products and services became available to consumers during the past fifteen years and are the result of digital

technologies. They exist today because they reflect an understanding of consumer needs and consumer behavior.

4. Consumer behavior is defined as the behavior that consumers display in searching for, purchasing, using, evaluating, and disposing of products and

services that they expect will satisfy their needs.

*****Use Key Term consumer behavior Here; Use Learning Objective #2 Here*****

a) Consumer behavior focuses on how individuals make decisions to spend their available resources on consumption-related items.

b) As consumers, we play a vital role in the health of the economy—local, national, and international. 

c) Marketers need to know everything they can about consumers.

d) Marketers need to understand the personal and group influences that affect consumer decisions and how these decisions are made.

e) Marketers need to not only identify their target audiences, but they need to know where and how to reach them.

5. The term consumer behavior is often used to describe two different kinds of consuming entities: the personal consumer and the organizational

consumer. 

a) The personal consumer buys goods and services for his or her own use, for the use of the household, or as a gift for a friend.

i) Products are bought for final use by individuals (referred to as end users or ultimate consumers). 

b) The organizational consumer—includes profit and not-for-profit businesses, government agencies, and institutions, all of which must buy products,

equipment, and services in order to run their organizations6. Despite the importance of both categories of consumers, individuals and organizations, this

book will focus on the individual consumer, who purchases for his or her own personal use or for household use. a) End-use consumption is perhaps the

most pervasive of all types of consumer behavior.

*****Use Learning Objective #3 Here *****

DEVELOPMENT OF THE MARKETING CONCEPT AND THE DISCIPLINE OF CONSUMER BEHAVIOR

1. The field of consumer behavior is rooted in the marketing concept, a business orientation that evolved in the 1950s through several alternative

approaches toward doing business referred to, respectively, as the production concept, the product concept, and the selling concept.

*****Use Key Term marketing concept Here*****

2. The production concept is characterized as the concept used by Henry Ford in the early 1900s.

a) Ford produced a car for $850 in an era when only the wealthy could afford a car.

b) The assembly line concept allowed him to reduce the price to $360.

c) Because of Ford’s products, Americans developed the nation’s extensive highway system and, eventually, suburbs and their adjacent shopping malls.

d) The production concept assumes that consumers are mostly interested in product availability at low prices.

i) Implicit marketing objectives  are cheap, efficient production, and intensive distribution systems.

ii) This concept makes sense when consumers are more interested in obtaining the product than they are in specific features.

3. The product concept assumes that consumers will buy the product that offers them the highest quality, the best performance, and the most features.

a) A product orientation leads the company to strive constantly to improve the quality of its product and to add new features that are technically feasible

without finding out first whether or not consumers really want these features.b) This concept leads to “marketing myopia,” that is, a focus on the product

rather than on the consumer needs it presumes to satisfy.

i) Railroads are often used as an example of marketing myopia.

ii) A more modern example of marketing myopia might be the PDA.

4. The selling concept is a natural extension of the production and product concepts. In this concept, marketing’s primary focus is selling the product(s)

that it has unilaterally decided to produce.

a) A hard sell approach is often used to persuade consumers to buy something (even if they do not really want it).

b) A negative of this concept is that consumers may not return for repeat sales because they may not have wanted the product to begin with.

c) This approach is typically used by the marketers of unsought goods (such as life insurance).

*****Use Learning Objective #4 Here; Use Exercise #3 Here*****

The Marketing Concept

1. The field of consumer behavior is rooted in a marketing strategy that evolved in the late 1950s.

2. Instead of trying to persuade customers to buy what the firm had already produced, marketing-oriented firms found that it was a lot easier to produce

only products they had first confirmed, through research, that consumers wanted.

a) This consumer-oriented concept came to be known as the marketing concept.

b) Consumer needs and wants became the firm’s primary focus.

The key assumption: 

c) To be successful, a company must determine the needs and wants of specific target markets and deliver the desired satisfactions better than the

competition. 

3. The marketing concept is based on the premise that a marketer should make what it can sell, instead of trying to sell what it has made.

a) The older selling concept focused on the needs of the seller.

b) The marketing concept focuses on the needs of the buyer.

Unethical practices in marketing - examples\u2022

Pricing lack of clarity in pricing\u2022

Dumping \u2013 selling at a loss to increase market share and destroy competition inorder to subsequently raise prices\u2022

Price fixing cartels\u2022

Encouraging people to claim prizes when they phoning premium rate numbers\u2022

\u201cBait and switch\u201d selling - attracting customers and then subjecting them to highpressure selling techniques to switch to an more expensive alternative\u2022

High pressure selling - especially in relation to groups such as the elderly\u2022

Counterfeit goods and brand piracy\u2022

Copying the style of packaging in an attempt to mislead consumers\u2022

Deceptive advertising\u2022

Irresponsible issue of credit cards and the irresponsible raising of credit limits\u2022

Unethical practices in market research and competitor intelligence