Safety attitudes, cost perceptions and price premium acceptance of ready-to-eat food among consumers
Ang Li, Toritseju BeghoPurpose
The expansion of online food delivery platforms has reshaped how people access meals. Although convenience and platform accessibility have dominated studies, less attention has been given to how consumer safety attitudes relate to cost perceptions and willingness to pay a premium. This study aims to investigate these relationships by analysing how food safety concerns influence affordability judgements and price premium acceptance in food delivery behaviour.
Design/methodology/approach
Using survey data from 573 Chinese respondents, the study examines patterns in safety attitudes and applies chi-square tests, multinomial logistic regression and hierarchical clustering to explore behavioural associations.
Findings
The results show that passive food safety preferences are widespread, but active safety behaviours such as avoiding unsafe outlets are less common and more predictive of affordability perceptions. Paradoxically, respondents with stronger safety concerns were less willing to pay a premium for ready-to-eat food. Cluster analysis revealed three distinct consumer segments; these were time-savers, quality-seekers and socially driven consumers, each characterised by differing motivations, levels of safety concern and sensitivity to cost. These findings suggest that food safety in delivery contexts operates more as a behavioural filter than a value premium. For food delivery platforms, this means safety should be treated as a basic service expectation. A more granular understanding of how safety concerns intersect with cost perceptions across user types can support context-appropriate interventions to enhance both the safety and inclusiveness of food delivery systems.
Originality/value
The study provides a novel behavioural analysis of food delivery choices by linking safety concerns, affordability judgements and consumer segmentation.