Paketera upplevelsen - En kvantitativ studie om hur fraktförpackningar kan påverka köpupplevelsen online

Sammanfattning: E-commerce is growing rapidly, and consumers demands on the online shopping experience are increasing. Meanwhile, retailers aim to offer a seamless online purchase journey where their brand is perceived as consistent throughout the process. The delivery point is the consumers first encounter with the product and the last part of the online experience. However, retailers are still to a large extent delivering products to customers in generic shipping boxes without taking the importance of the delivery packaging into account. Further research is therefore needed on the impact of shipping boxes as an integral part of the online purchase. This paper thus examines if shipping boxes influences customers evaluation of their shopping experience. With a basis in signaling theory and a quantitative study, this paper concludes that when customers receive their product in a hedonic shipping box, compared to a utilitarian, they perceive the retailer's effort and the product quality as higher. Simultaneously, they are more satisfied with their overall purchase and report higher brand attitude, loyalty, re-purchase intention and willingness to pay. Furthermore, the paper investigates whether the results differ with regards to customers hedonic or utilitarian shopping motivation. The study reveals that every variable except for perceived ability are evaluated significantly higher when a hedonic shipping box is used for delivery, regardless of shopper motivation. Ultimately, this indicates that shipping boxes can act as a signal that can lower information asymmetry between online retailers and customers and improve the overall online shopping experience.