Ouriel Blum,
MAR 100 – B050
Professor Buckler
November 18, 2023
Consumer Decision Making
As new residents of Salt Lake City, Utah, my family and I wanted to transport a little bit of our former lives in New York City to our new home and that entailed finding the same food that we love. We always enjoyed the many authentic Italian restaurants in NYC and so began a search to find something similarly appealing in Salt Lake City. The type of Italian restaurant I was looking for would serve authentic, southern Italian cuisine – not too fancy or too casual. It would also be a place that paid attention to the source and quality of its ingredients. Ideally, it would be a restaurant where the chef would occasionally come out and greet the guests. Since I would be busy with integrating into a new job, I needed a place that could offer delivery service as well. I also was not prepared to pay the same in Salt Lake as I was in NYC, so the price point would have to be below that of my local NYC Italian restaurant. Lastly, the restaurant needed to be within driving distance of my new home. All these factors defined the first step in the consumer decision making process, “need recognition”.
For the next step of the consumer decision making process, “information search”, I turned to my attention to the internet. There are many online resources to consider, for example: OpenTable (www.opentable.com), TripAdvisor (www.tripadvisor.com) google (www.google.com) as well as many local online magazines that rank the many Italian restaurants in the city. I did not spend too much time on TripAdvisor because that seems to target people who have a short time in the city and want to experience something more “special” since they are on vacation. I was looking for a restaurant that I could return to, time and again. My first google search brought up three different restaurants on the first page. I paid attention to the ratings that the restaurant had as well as the number of ratings, since the more ratings a restaurant has, the more I trust the rating itself. The first restaurant I looked at was Caffe Molise. I checked the ratings (4.5 with over 3,000 ratings) and the location through Google, and I also saw that they offered pickup and delivery in addition to in-restaurant dining. Then I looked at the menu on the restaurant website which seemed authentically southern Italian. The other two restaurants that showed up on Google had lower ratings, so I did not follow up with those. However, when I clicked on “more restaurants”, I saw that Olive Garden had a 4.4 rating, which made me wonder about the 4.5 rating for Caffe Molise. The next one I looked at was Osteria Amore, which had a 4.6 rating and similar dining options to Caffe Molise. However, they moved to the top of my list because they noted on their menu that “all pastas are homemade using fresh organic local eggs and Caputo flour”. That alone was enough to put them at the top of my list but the fact that their price point was also lower than Caffe Molise was also a plus. Lastly, I cross-checked both restaurants against a two local magazine’s lists of the best Italian restaurants and read their reviews. Both of the ones I chose were on the list so I felt that I could not go wrong with either option.
What I realize about the consumer decision making process is that internet search results can significantly impact how a restaurant is discovered. Local news pieces can supplement that online search, but the initial restaurants that show up have a distinct benefit. I also realize that ratings can have a huge impact on a new consumer, who might have little else on which to base a decision. Lastly, I think that restaurants should do more to differentiate themselves upfront. For example, fresh, authentic ingredients are important to me, but it was very hard to find a restaurant that advertised that, and I had to search on the menus. It is possible that Caffe Molise also uses authentic ingredients, but since they did not advertise as such, I did not choose it. My preferences are driven by my experience in NYC, which might not be the same taste or flavor profile as local people have in Salt Lake, which might also be why Olive Garden got a 4.4 rating. My conclusion is that differentiation helps with online searching, which is how many people look for restaurants today.
