Browsing by Subject "just-about-right"

There is growing concern about the world population growth and the sufficiency of protein resources. Edible insects could be an alternative protein source for human beings. The aim of this master thesis was to examine the sensory characteristics of a new home cricket (Acheta Domesticus) product and understand the attitudes of consumers towards edible insects. The aim was to investigate the impact of consumer familiarity with edible insect food products on purchase intention and expected liking. The roles of media trust and purchase activism were expected to affect the behavior of consumers. Besides these four indicators also two more were added. These were food neophobia scale and innovativeness. The data on consumer attitudes and perception towards insect food was collected by using an electronic form that was sent to different mailing lists. Total of 167 respondents were gathered, 141 women and 63 men. 53 participants attended the sensory analysis tests on the beginning of the year 2020, ages 18 – 62. The analysis of the data was done with SPSS Statistics version 25. The findings of this study indicate that consumer familiarity contributes to purchase activism, purchase intention and expected liking. In this study the media trust did not contribute. Food neophobia scores correlated negatively to the intention to buy, expected liking and willingness to recommend the product. Innovativeness correlated positively to intention to buy and expected liking, and as expected, innovativeness correlated negatively to food neophobia scores. As people learn more about the ecological and nutritional benefits of edible insects, their attitudes towards insect food become more positive and they are more willing to try and taste insect products. The new home cricket product, PANNU Sirkka by GRiiDY, turned out to be quite suitable for Finnish consumers taste. On the just-about-right scale (1–4) the average score was 3,3 – 3,8 of all the assessed attributes. Many of the open responses mentioned the product to be ‘tasty, delicious, surprisingly good and crispy’, for instance. To overcome the preconceptions of western consumers, there should be more occasions to try and taste insect food. Marketing efforts are best targeted to consumers who are neophilic and innovative and encourage them to be the early adopters of insect food.