– The purpose of this paper is to examine how consumers set bargaining goal when they negotiate price of relatively less expensive shopping products with salesperson. The impact of bargaining goal on bargaining outcomes is also discussed.
– To increase realism and external validity, actual transactions in the shopping malls of two cities of China were observed unobtrusively, followed by a matched survey with the consumer to collect data on variables that could not be observed.
– Product knowledge, presence of purchase plan and shopping companion, posited to reflect consumer's bargaining power, are found to influence the bargaining goal set by the consumer. Satisfaction toward the transaction outcome depends on the extent of goal achievement rather than the ultimate concession obtained or the perceived fair price of the product, and such satisfaction affects future patronage likelihood.
– A different research methodology is used to study retail price negotiation. Instead of only using student subjects to understand how consumers negotiate price in a hypothetical setting, the current study collected data from actual transactions. This enables us to study how contextual variables such as shopping companion and purchase plan affect negotiation goal which in turn influences satisfaction and future patronage. A comparison of the reference standards adopted for evaluating bargaining outcome is also performed.
