Customer satisfaction, loyalty, knowledge and competitiveness in the food industry

The subject of this article is customer satisfaction, loyalty, knowledge and business competitiveness from the perspective of a food-industry customer. This article aims to analyse the relationship between customer satisfaction, customer loyalty, product knowledge, business competitiveness and other selected factors which influence customer satisfaction. The research is aimed at customers who purchase the product in question repeatedly and have personal experience with this product. The research was carried out using a questionnaire which was presented to the respondents, who were customers of the selected companies. In order to model the relationships between the factors, a structural equation model approach was used. The research showed the direct influence of the product-knowledge variable on customer expectation and product competitiveness, as well as the influence of customer loyalty on product knowledge. Increased loyalty thus leads to the customer’s increased knowledge of the product. The rate of repeat purchase of the same product is important for the relationship between the variables. In this case, customer expectation was shown to be an important variable which is influenced by customer satisfaction. It can be concluded that when a product’s price is set correctly in relation to its quality, the price does not affect other research factors.