Abstract:
The purposes of this study were to investigate consumers buying behavior and factors affecting their decision to buy OTOP herbal cosmetics. The informants of this study were 400 people with the age of 15 years upward, living in Bangkok, and who used to buy the products. Questionnaires were used to collect the data. Frequency, percentage, arithmetic mean, standard deviation, Chi-square, t-test, ANOVA, and LSD analysis were used to analyze the data via computer software. Most informants frequently bought soap and bathing crème. The buying objective was for own use. Their decision to buy was made by themselves. They bought the products every month, 2- 3 pieces at a time from hypermarkets. They knew about the products at the OTOP booths in trade fairs. The reason for buying was that they believed in its quality which they took into consideration before buying.
The investigation of the relationship between buying behavior and the consumers background revealed that sex played an important role on types of the products most frequently bought, own decision, person influencing decision, and media advertising the products while age, educational background, and occupation of consumers had something to do with types of the products most frequently bought, person influencing decision, buying frequency, number of items bought each time, buying places and information on the package. It was also found that consumers age and educational background affected their decision while their educational background and occupation had something to do with media advertising the products, reason for buying. Some relationship was also found between occupation and buying objectives. As for their monthly income, the study indicated some connection with buying objectives, own decision,
number of items bought, and media advertising the products. Regarding the significance level of factors affecting consumers decision to buy OTOP herbal cosmetics, The rating, as a whole, by-aspects and by-items was at a high level. According to the comparison of the arithmetic mean of the rating, it was found that the consumers rated the products as the most important followed by distribution place, price, and promotion respectively. It could be said that consumers were willing to buy, no matter how expensive the product was or whether the promotion was good or not. The comparison of the significance level of factors affecting decision to buy OTOP herbal cosmetics among consumers with different personal background revealed significant differences as a whole except for the consumers with different sex in which one item was found so. That is, female consumers put more importance on brand than male. For the consumers with different age, differences were found in 3 aspects and 12 items while those with different educational background rated 2 aspects and 10 items differently. The consumers with different occupation rated 3 aspects and 8 items differently while those with different monthly income rated 2 aspects and 5 items
differently. The need analysis showed that the consumers needed chemical-free products with reasonable price. More distribution channel and trade fairs were needed.