FEATURES OF IMPULSE BUYING IN CROATIAN RETAIL

Abstract

Impulse buying is an unplanned decision to buy a product or service, made instantaneously on the point of sale. Some of the internal factors that affect impulse purchasing are age, gender, mood, income or culture, and the external factors include the store's environment. Impulse purchases can be explained by the relationship between the affective and cognitive components in the brain of customers. The affective part refers to feelings, emotions, and moods, while the cognitive refers to thinking, understanding, and processing information. So, when the emotional part overwhelms the cognitive, it is more likely that an impulse purchase will occur. The main research hypothesis is that in the Croatian retail almost the same amount of purchases is planned and impulsive. From our primary online research conducted in 2017 among 115 Croatian consumers (N = 115), it follows that most of them (27%) buy consumer goods in the ratio 70% planned purchases: 30% unplanned purchases (19% women and 9% of men). This means that women in Croatia are buying more impulsively than men. From this it follows that our main research hypothesis was only partially confirmed. The results show that in consumer goods retail only 17% of Croatian citizens (12% of women and 5% of men) demonstrate an equal ratio (50%:50%) of planned and impulse buying.