Changing Attitude of Consumers: A Study Among Urbanworking Women

Consumer attitude is a learnt predisposition to respond to an object or act consistently ina favorable or unfavorable manner and is shaped by one's values and beliefs which are learnt. However Values are personally or socially preferable modes of conduct or states of existence that are enduring. In contrast , beliefs are consumer's subjective perception of how well a product or brand performs on different attributes. The various approaches to change the consumer attitude are like Changing beliefs about the extent to which a brand has certain attributes; Changing the perceived importance of attributes; and adding new attributes to the product etc.. Only by changing the consumer's attitude can they be influenced to enact a merchandise transaction in the modern marketing mileau. Hence the importance of attitude change is of paramountimportance tomarketerswho are consumer centric in the modern age often customizing the products/services to match the tastes of the consumer by proper positioning and targeting strategies. In this study the consumer attitude towards two different class of products like the FMCG and White goods are contrasted among the working women in an urban habitat ,the Kochi metro in Kerala which is the commercial hub and leading test marketing site in India .Over the past decade, Kochi has evidenced substantial growth i n sales/consumption of both FMCG and Durables with a noticeable change in consumer attitude on spending /consumption of goods for family use(affinity for modernity with higher buying power), which is explored herein. The various facets of the working/Career women as Consumer are brought out , with substantial contribution towards their current consumer behavior to enable facilitate appropriate PUSH-PULL marketing strategies on the FMCG - Durables, which are bundles of attributes.