ABSTRACT
The food market is increasingly becoming a consumer market. The development of the food market from a product-driven to a consumer-driven orientation is firmly embedded in, as well as consistent with, a process which characterises the wider socio-economic context. A mere economic or materialistic idea of consumption and the consumer society is today insufficient and unrealistic. The emotional or non-material factor in current economies is a driving force behind the consumer society – the attraction of brands and their logos is just one manifestation of this phenomenon. Two dimensions are expected to underlie consumer behaviour. The first dimension ranges from materialist to non-materialist, the second from individualistic to collectivistic. Based on these two dimensions, then, four different consumer images are distinguished in a four-fold analysis of types of consumer behaviours, labelled calculating, traditional, unique, and responsible. The consumer images approach conveys the idea that the clientele of the food market is quirky.
