ASSESSING THE MAXIMUM LEVEL OF CUSTOMER SATISFACTION IN GROCERY STORES: A COMPARISON BETWEEN SPAIN AND THE USA

The marketing literature has shown how certain grocery store attributes act as critical determinants in the differentiation of one store from another in consumer markets. From this introductory consideration, this work establishes the main factors that underlie these attributes in order to examine which of them present a greater influence on the maximum level of customer satisfaction. The study is performed in two countries from different continents, enabling the observation of differences not only between factor composition, but also their influence on customer satisfaction, depending on the focal country. To test the proposed analysis, we analyzed two different samples of customers that had completed purchases in grocery stores of Spain (Europe) and the United States (America). This work represents a useful contribution to the existing literature since it assesses differences in the main factors that contribute to customer satisfaction depending on the nationality of the customer. This work is especially useful to those grocery retailers that intend to operate in different continents, as it determines the main factors to take into consideration in order to successful launch a transnational grocery store.