Purchase Intention of Certified Coffee: Evidence from Thailand

This study examines social identity and self-identity as the antecedents of the theory of planned behavior (TPB) model in predicting purchase intention of certified coffee, whereas perceived trustworthiness (PT) is evaluated whether it directly affects intention and/or indirectly through attitude. In addition, ethics and luxury are investigated as the salient beliefs affecting attitude formation in this regard. A face-to-face survey was conducted with 727 coffee consumers in Thailand. Confirmatory factor analysis is applied to assess the adequacy of the model, followed by structural equation modeling to evaluate the hypotheses proposed for the relationships between constructs in an extended TPB model. The results confirm that self-identity is the most influential antecedent on attitude when compared to social identity, and attitude, in turn, is the strongest determinant in predicting purchase intention. PT has a direct positive effect on purchase intention, meanwhile, ethical, luxury beliefs, and PT are confirmed to portrait the attitude formation. As such the marketing campaigns can address manipulating consumers' beliefs on both ethical and luxury aspects as well as PT, along with consumers' social identity and self-identity to fortify a positive attitude toward certified coffee. Then the actual purchase behavior can be foreseen based on empirical evidence.