Family buying behaviour : parents’ perspective of children influence on their buying behaviour

Abstract: Even though power and influence of children on family buying behavior is growing little is known about their involvement. Previous studies of family and household consumption often neglect the role of children in decision-making, but nowadays, children are becoming one of the most powerful influencers in family buying behavior. They dominate family buying decision and can influence their parents in many product categories from cars till regular grocery shopping and therefore the question arises, what influences children when requesting products and what strategies they use to make their parents yield to their requests. Thus, this research paper tries to explain how are influence strategies that children use and family complexity related to parents buying behavior of groceries. The primary data have been collected through an electronic questionnaire, which resulted in sample of 164 parents respondents from around the globe. The data were analyzed by using various statistical tools and concluded that (1) aggressive, persuasion, rational and knowledge strategies are positively affecting parents buying behavior, (2) non-traditional family structure has positive impact on buying behavior, (3) older children have more influence power over parents buying behavior and (4) number of children has no significant influence on parents buying behavior.