CH.8: Judgment and Decision-Making Based on High Effort

Emotional Accounting 

                        

Consumers are given positive feelings with each mental account for saving/spending at Costco because of their deals and unique finds. Upon Costco's mission statement of continually providing its members with quality goods and services at the lowest possible price, consumers feel good about shopping at Costco. With such discounts on goods like name brand products, foods, and clothing items, consumers relate their shopping experience to be a positive one. Their mood can also increase when they find a certain item at Costco. This also gives consumers the incentive to come back to Costco if they have experienced a positive mood/feeling. Not only can they feel good about having an exclusive deal based on their membership, but they also acknowledge the fact that they get to save more going to Costco rather than going to a grocery or department store. This allows consumers to make such purchases based on high effort. When consumers feel good about shopping, it becomes easier to make these purchases. 

                        

Group Decision Making

                            

At Costco, people make their decisions both by the influence of other people as well as their own influence. There is a goal when going to Costco or any other place. The goal is to buy what you need. While trying to achieve your goal it is easy to catch yourself buying things that you do not need but maybe want. With individual-alone goals, a person will get what they went for and saw something they liked and made it a part of their goal. They influenced themselves. I would say food may be an individual-alone goal because it is a necessity. In individual-group goals, the goals have been influenced by another individual or a group. Clothes or electronics may be an individual-group goal because it's not a necessity and may take more persuasion to buy. At Costco, it's easy to create a new goal especially with the abundance of products they have as well with the price those products are marked at.