Browsing by Author "Mattila, Maria"

This thesis focuses on online pharmacies and the consumers who order oral nutritional supplements through these purchase channels. This thesis aims to investigate the factors that influence consumers' choices to buy oral nutritional supplements from online pharmacies and what motivates them to do so. The consumers using oral nutritional supplements can be generalized as a segment of elderly consumers. The thesis has a relevant topic, since already almost one third of Finland’s population is over 65-year-olds and the number of elderly consumers will increase in the future. As the population gets older demand for products and services that improve health, mobility, and overall quality of life increase. The COVID-19 pandemic led to a surge in the demand for purchasing pharmacy products online, not only in Finland but also globally. Although online pharmacy services are relatively new, especially many elderly consumers have turned towards them as a result of the pandemic. General lack of trust in e-commerce and poor electronic service skills are barriers for senior consumers to adapt the use of online pharmacies. The thesis was done in co-operation with a Finnish online pharmacy and company x. The research was carried out as a quantitative study using a questionnaire with 83 consumers who had used an online pharmacy at least once to purchase oral nutritional supplements. The data was analyzed using statistical programs (Microsoft Excel 2203 and IBM SPSS Statistics 28). An online pharmacy was seen as a good purchase channel to buy oral nutritional supplements. Those who ordered oral nutritional supplements online used the online pharmacy as a purchase channel only for these products. Based on these research results the elderly find buying oral nutritional supplements from online pharmacies important because of their heavy weight, but they still prefer buying other pharmacy products from brick-and-mortar stores.