CONSUMERS' ATTITUDE AND PREFERENCES OF FUNCTIONAL FOOD: A QUALITATIVE CASE STUDY

The present qualitative study is based on 50 participants responsible of household food shopping. Their in-depth interviews were conducted with the consumers from the four superstores located in Faisalabad to explore consumers' views, preferences, attitude, acceptance of functional food (FF) and evaluation of different attributes like organoleptic, label, functionality along with health claim, price and brand. The analysis of qualitative data demonstrates that consumers had the concept of FF along with information and knowledge about different attributes of FF. All the attributes are important but the most importantly health claim attribute was the most valuable. Desire for seeking more information by the participants about FF also emerged in the study. The customers also attached significance to price in relation to purchase of FF particularly branded. Participants criticism on different conventional foods like fruit juices, milk and biscuits and bread (Chapati) available in the market about the poor quality and their recommendations of FFs to the other people create more space of marketing for this food that can be exploited by the FF industry. It is recommended that peoples should be made aware about the perceived benefits and threats of FFs and these foods may carry seal approved by regulatory body for ensuring quality and safety.