18F-16 |
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M. E. THOMAS and W. Prinyawiwatkul. Dept. of Food Science, Louisiana State Univ. Agricultural Center, 111 Food Science Bldg., Baton Rouge, LA 70803-4200 Nowadays consumers are more health conscious. Fruit juice blends with new flavors and added healthy ingredients continue to be popular. We successfully developed lutein-enriched sweet potato juice (1.53 mg lutein in 12-fluid-oz juice). However, 100% sweet potato juice was not acceptable. Juice blends containing sweet potato, pineapple, and mango were more acceptable to consumers. Male and female consumers may perceive this product differently. Understanding gender impact on acceptance and purchase decision is critical to the product success. This study evaluated gender impact on drivers of product acceptance and purchase decision of novel lutein-enriched sweet potato, pineapple, and mango juice blends. Consumers (n=300) evaluated 10 juice blends containing 50 to 100% sweet potato juice and 6.25 to 50% mango or pineapple juice, following the balanced incomplete block design. They evaluated acceptability of appearance/color, aroma, sweet potato aroma, flavor, sweetness, sourness, mouthfeel, and overall liking using a 9-point hedonic scale. Overall acceptance and purchase decisions were determined using a yes/no scale. Data were analyzed using multivariate analysis of variance, descriptive discriminant analysis, and logistic regression analysis (α=0.10). Both male and female consumers differentiated 10 juice blends based on aroma, flavor, and overall liking. Drivers of overall acceptance were appearance/color, flavor, sweetness, and overall liking for male consumers, and sourness, mouthfeel, and overall liking for female consumers. Drivers of purchase decision were flavor and overall liking for male consumers, and overall liking alone for female consumers. The probability (odds ratio) of accepting the juice blends for male vs. female consumers was not significant (prob.=0.4017). However, the probability that male consumers would purchase the juice blends more than female consumers was 1.307 times higher (prob.=0.0630). This study revealed that male and female consumers responded differently toward these juice blends. The information is useful for further product refinement and market segmentation.
Session 18F, Product Development: General
2005 IFT Annual Meeting, July 15-20 - New Orleans, Louisiana |