Introduction

The purpose of this report is to analyse and discuss how 2 consumer behaviour theories are applied in the Chinese chocolate market as well as how it differs from the Australian market. This paper discuss the chocolate industry of the most populous country of the world based on Market Segmentation and Maslow’s Theory, moreover presents how the Asian country is a potential market for Australian exporters.

Chocolate history in China

The Chinese taste for chocolate is relatively new if compared to the age of the country, the brown sweet was first introduced in the 80s (Allen 2011) from American and European companies. The product was considered exotic and prestigious, a luxury item because was imported resulting …show more content…

From this data we can also extrapolate opportunities for Australian exporters of Tim-Tams, primarily in terms of age. Different age groups will have different preferences for eating, particularly in China. Older people do not like to eat sweets due to their past years of eating habits. Young people are starting to eat sweets and other new products, but only the minorty of them have the ability to afford it. Due to the large population in China, the government has introduced a “One Child Policy”, restricting each family to having one child, in order to slow down its exponential growth. Thus, the influence of younger people is still likely to be inferior to that of the elder population for some years to come. In contrast to Australia, our rate of overweight adults is 67.4%, thus suggesting a culture of eating foods which are generally not regarded as being healthy.

Sociocultural segmentation refers to segmenting a market on the basis of factors such as cultural values, ethics and beliefs. For example, China tends to have preferences in cuisine based upon the traditional banquet-type occurrences of past dynasties. However in the consumer segment of China fast-food industries are growing due to people having less time and more spending power, thus suggesting Tim-Tam’s may not suffer from cultural barriers as they are a tasty convenient snack.

A major consideration for