The starting point of this dissertation is the increasing number of Swedish consumers who use the Internet forshopping. Convenience is said to be an important ground for this choice. However, there are few studies thatattempt to understand the true meaning of convenience. This study sets out to understand what convenienceentails for Internet shoppers, what characterizes a convenient Internet shopper, what charterizes a convenientonline product or service, and finally how different meanings of convenience can be explained in differentshopping situations. The purpose of this study is to deepen the understanding of consumers’ conveniencegrounds when shopping online. Qualitative data was collected from 24 respondents, 12 female and 12 male,living in the Swedish cities of Örnsköldsvik, Stockholm, Göteborg and Borås. Data collection was mainlyconducted by means of group interviews and additional personal interviews, questionnaries and shoppingexperiment observations. The study has its theoretical outlook based in convenience literature, and conveniencemotives when choosing a particular store, however, adjusted to better fit the phenomenon of onlineshopping.This theoretical approach emphasizes different dimensions of convenience and gives special insight intoremote shopping consumers. Results show that convenience is an important ground for Internet shopping.Convenience in this context, can be seen from a psychological and/or behavioural perspective. However,grounds for convenience entail efficiency and rationality reasons for all of the respondents included in thestudy. These results indicate that convenience is best understood by using a resource efficiency approach.When using this approach the study shows the importance among the respondents to save time and energy,both from a psychological as well as a physiological perspective. Another useful explanation in order tounderstand the meaning of convenience is to use consumers’ descriptions of themselves as planned orimpulsive. In most cases the respondents describe themselves as planned consumers, which in turn indicatethat the use of a resource efficency perspective is valuable.It is a great variety of products and services described as convenient, however the study pinpoints twoexceptions: home electronic devices and tickets. The study shows that one reason for the differences inconsumers’ convenience perceptions is how time is perceived. Another reason is how customer perceivespsychological or physiological energy. A third reason is how they perceive security and safety. Another importantresult is that convenience differs between women and men in the study. The female consumer givespriority to saving time and saving physical energy. The male consumer gives priority to timing. The study’s resultscan help online businesses to identify how their customers perceive convenience to better designcommunication, virtual store, information, payment and deliviery according to their wants and needs. Anotherpractical implication drawn from the findings is to use direct delivery when possible and offer home delivery. / <p>AKADEMISK AVHANDLING: För avläggande av ekonomie doktorsexamen i företagsekonomi som</p><p>med tillstånd av Handelshögskolans fakultetsnämnd vid Göteborgs</p><p>universitet framlägges till offentlig granskning fredagen den 5 oktober</p><p>2007, kl 10—12 i sal B33 vid Företagsekonomiska Institutionen,</p><p>Vasagatan 1, Göteborg.</p>
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:hb-3419 |
| Date | January 2007 |
| Creators | Sundström, Malin |
| Publisher | Högskolan i Borås, Institutionen Handels- och IT-högskolan, Göteborg University, School of Business, Economics and Law, Department of Business Administration |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Doctoral thesis, monograph, info:eu-repo/semantics/doctoralThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
| Relation | Skrifter från Högskolan i Borås, 0280-381X ; 6 |
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