文档介绍：5
The consumer in product development
Consumers are the centre of product development in the food industry, directly
in the design of consumer products and indirectly in the design modity
products and industrial products. In industrial product development, the
emphasis is on the immediate customer, but consideration needs to be given
to the acceptance of the final product by the consumer. It is important in product
development to understand basic consumer behaviour and food choice as well as
the individual product/consumer relationship (Earle, 1997). Differences among
the individual consumers and variations in their environments influence their
buying, preparing and eating behaviour. These differences cause variations in
food choice and in the degree of acceptance of individual foods. The consumers’
total concept of a food is related to their individual characteristics and to the
environment in which they buy and eat food.
Consumers are, and will remain, the final arbiters on food product
acceptance. The consumer of the new food product gives the ultimate decision
on the product development project and therefore it is crucial that the consumer
is a major player in critical evaluation throughout the project. But it is even more
important to incorporate the consumer in the creative processes in product
development. It is wrong to assume that the product designer, the process
developer and the marketer know who are the target consumers and what they
want and need. The consumers have to identify themselves, and help to create a
product that fits into their life styles and also leads them into their desired future.
The consumer needs to be involved in all stages of the product development
project. At one time, this seemed an expensive, theoretical and time-consuming
activity, and was often ignored in pany. Today, consumer research is
more easily coordinated into product development, with the use of modern
consumer research techniques to study