Categorizing Quality Features of Franchisees: In the case of Korean Food Service Industry

프랜차이즈 매장 품질요인의 속성분류: 국내 외식업을 중심으로

  • Received : 2010.08.02
  • Accepted : 2010.09.28
  • Published : 2011.01.30

Abstract

Food service is the major part of franchise business in Korea, accounting for 69.9% of the brands in the market. As the food service industry becomes mature, many franchisees have struggled to survive in the market. In general, consumers have higher levels of expectation toward service quality of franchised outlets compared that of (non-franchised) independent ones. They also tend to believe that franchisees deliver standardized service at the uniform food price, regardless of their locations. Such beliefs seem to be important reasons that consumers prefer franchised outlets to independent ones. Nevertheless, few studies examined the impact of qualify features of franchisees on customer satisfaction so far. To this end, this study examined the characteristics of various quality features of franchisees in the food service industry, regarding their relationship with customer satisfaction and dissatisfaction. The quality perception of heavy-users was also compared with that of light-users in order to find insights for developing differentiated marketing strategy for the two segments. Customer satisfaction has been understood as a one-dimensional construct while there are recent studies that insist two-dimensional nature of the construct. In this regard, Kano et al. (1984) suggested to categorize quality features of a product or service into five types, based on their relation to customer satisfaction and dissatisfaction: Must-be quality, Attractive quality, One-dimensional quality, Indifferent quality, and Reverse quality. According to the Kano model, customers are more dissatisfied when Must-be quality(M) are not fulfilled, but their satisfaction does not arise above neutral no matter how fully the quality fulfilled. In comparison, customers are more satisfied with a full provision of Attactive quality(A) but manage to accept its dysfunction. One-dimensional quality(O) results in satisfaction when fulfilled and dissatisfaction when not fulfilled. For Indifferent quality(I), its presence or absence influences neither customer satisfaction nor dissatisfaction. Lastly, Reverse quality(R) refers to the features whose high degree of achievement results in customer dissatisfaction rather than satisfaction. Meanwhile, the basic guidelines of the Kano model have a limitation in that the quality type of each feature is simply determined by calculating the mode statistics. In order to overcome such limitation, the relative importance of each feature on customer satisfaction (Better value; b) and dissatisfaction (Worse value; w) were calculated following the formulas below (Timko, 1993). The Better value indicates how much customer satisfaction is increased by providing the quality feature in question. In contrast, the Worse value indicates how much customer dissatisfaction is decreased by providing the quality feature. Better = (A + O)/(A+O+M+I) Worse = (O+M)/(A+O+M+I)(-1) An on-line survey was performed in order to understand the nature of quality features of franchisees in the food service industry by applying the Kano Model. A total of twenty quality features (refer to the Table 2) were identified as the result of literature review in franchise business and a pre-test with fifty college students in Seoul. The potential respondents of our main survey was limited to the customers who have visited more than two restaurants/stores of the same franchise brand. Survey invitation e-mails were sent out to the panels of a market research company and a total of 257 responses were used for analysis. Following the guidelines of Kano model, each of the twenty quality features was classified into one of the five types based on customers' responses to a set of questions: "(1) how do you feel if the following quality feature is fulfilled in the franchise restaurant that you visit," and "(2) how do you feel if the following quality feature is not fulfilled in the franchise restaurant that you visit." The analyses revealed that customers' dissatisfaction with franchisees is commonly associated with the poor level of cleanliness of the store (w=-0.872), kindness of the staffs(w=-0.890), conveniences such as parking lot and restroom(w=-0.669), and expertise of the staffs(w=-0.492). Such quality features were categorized as Must-be quality in this study. While standardization or uniformity across franchisees has been emphasized in franchise business, this study found that consumers are interested only in uniformity of price across franchisees(w=-0.608), but not interested in standardizations of menu items, interior designs, customer service procedures, and food tastes. Customers appeared to be more satisfied when the franchise brand has promotional events such as giveaways(b=0.767), good accessibility(b=0.699), customer loyalty programs(b=0.659), award winning history(b=0.641), and outlets in the overseas market(b=0.506). The results are summarized in a matrix form in Table 1. Better(b) and Worse(w) index indicate relative importance of each quality feature on customer satisfaction and dissatisfaction, respectively. Meanwhile, there were differences in perceiving the quality features between light users and heavy users of any specific franchise brand in the food service industry. Expertise of the staffs was labeled as Must-be quality for heavy users but Indifferent quality for light users. Light users seemed indifferent to overseas expansion of the brand and offering new menu items on a regular basis, while heavy users appeared to perceive them as Attractive quality. Such difference may come from their different levels of involvement when they eat out. The results are shown in Table 2. The findings of this study help practitioners understand the quality features they need to focus on to strengthen the competitive power in the food service market. Above all, removing the factors that cause customer dissatisfaction seems to be the most critical for franchisees. To retain loyal customers of the franchise brand, it is also recommended for franchisor to invest resources in the development of new menu items as well as training programs for the staffs. Lastly, if resources allow, promotional events, loyalty programs, overseas expansion, award-winning history can be considered as tools for attracting more customers to the business.

본 연구는 Kano모델을 활용하여 프랜차이즈 매장에 관한 다양한 품질요인들의 속성을 고객의 관점에서 분류하였다. 또한, 각 품질요인들이 고객의 만족 또는 불만족에 미치는 상대적 영향력을 분석해 보고자 만족지수와 불만족지수를 산출하였다. 자료 수집을 위해 외식 프랜차이즈 매장 방문 경험이 있는 서울 및 전국광역시 거주 성인들을 대상으로 온라인조사를 실시하였으며, 총 257개의 응답이 분석에 사용되었다. 분석 결과, 해당 품질요소가 충족이 되지 않는 경우 소비자의 불만으로 이어지는 요소에는 매장 청결도, 직원 친절도 및 숙련도, 편의시설 제공 등이 포함되는 것으로 나타났다. 프랜차이즈 사업에서 매장 간 음식메뉴의 구색, 가격, 품질수준, 인테리어, 고객서비스 절차 등의 표준화는 중요하게 생각되어 왔으나, 이 중 음식 가격의 동일성만이 고객의 불만족과 깊은 관계를 가지고 있었다. 충족이 되지 않아도 상관없지만 충족이 되는 경우 고객들의 호의적인 반응을 이끌어낼 수 있는 요소로는 외부기관으로부터의 수상 또는 인증 경력, 프랜차이즈 브랜드의 해외진출, 경품이벤트 및 사용금액에 따라 혜택을 주는 로열티 프로그램의 실시, 그리고 우수한 매장접근성이 해당되었다. 프랜차이즈 브랜드를 상대적으로 자주 이용하는 헤비유저의 경우, 정기적인 신메뉴 출시 또한 매력적인 품질요인으로 생각하고 있었다. 본 논문은 경영자가 우선적으로 관심을 두고 개선하여야 하는 부분과 경쟁력 확보를 위해 추가적으로 투자해야 할 부분이 어디인가에 대한 시사점을 제공해 준다는 점에서 연구의 의의가 있다.

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