The effect of discount discrepancy on purchase intention: the moderation of justification

What is it about?

Consumers are exposed to sales promotions when shopping online or offline. A typical sales promotion used in apparel retail is a price discount, because of the short life cycle of the products. Such price discounts are frequently announced by the claim “up to X% off”. Being attracted by the magnitude of the offered discount, shoppers will enter the store, only to find some products at the announced percent discount, and other products at smaller percent discounts. In this situation, consumers may perceive Discount Discrepancy (DD): i.e., a gap between the price discount expected from the announced price discount (e.g., up to 60% off), and the smaller actual price discount of a particular product (e.g., 20% off on the product the shopper wants to buy). How do consumers react to such apparent discrepancies? Will their purchase intention (PI) decrease? and, if so, can this be reversed? These are relevant questions because this situation occurs frequently in the retail sector, yet our literature review revealed no theoretical explanations for this phenomenon.

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