THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN STORE BRAND, CUSTOMER SATISFACTION, CUSTOMER STORE LOYALTY AND PERSONAL CUSTOMER CHARATERISTICS: AN EMPIRICAL SURVEY

The measurement and the analysis of customer satisfaction play an important role for firms, because if customers are not satisfied, not only will they not repurchase the product/service in the future, but will help produce harmful profits. The study aims at analyzing the relationship between a store brand, customer satisfaction, customer loyalty, and buying behaviour, in order to define the socio-demographic characteristics of loyal hypermarket clients, and to establish whether these features influence their loyalty and their emotional involvement. The objective of this work is to determine the impact that customer satisfaction has on loyalty behavior in the large retail market. We use a methodological statistical approach; an empirical survey was conducted by administering a research questionnaire to collect data and a descriptive and multivariate statistical processing was performed Research has shown the existence of a relationship of interdependence and dependence between variables of customer satisfaction and customer loyalty, the latter represented by variables that clarify the buying behavior of loyal customers such as: positive word of mouth; brand loyalty including searching for the same store when customers are shopping in other residential areas; and finally willingness to defend the hypermarket against criticism from others. The paper demonstrate the existence of a construct that combines, customer loyalty and customer satisfaction, widely debated in the scientific community, in relation to the specificity of service.