British Food Journal

Food safety concern: Incorporating marketing strategies into consumer risk coping
framework
Ruth Yeung Wallace M.S. Yee
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BFJ
114,1 Food safety concern
Incorporating marketing strategies into
consumer risk coping framework
40 Ruth Yeung
Institute for Tourism Studies, Colina de Mong-Ha, Macau, China, and
Received May 2010
Revised June 2010
Wallace M.S. Yee
Accepted June 2010 University of Macau, Taipa, Macau, China
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Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine how the incorporation of marketing elements into
consumer risk coping strategies affects consumer purchase decision during periods of food safety
concern.
Design/methodology/approach – This research used a structured questionnaire administered to a
convenience sample of 216 respondents. By using logistic regression, a consumer risk coping
framework incorporating marketing strategies was successfully developed to test the impact of brand
and quality assurance, price reduction, availability in all stores and endorsement from an independent
organization, which may not act alone but combine with each other during food purchase.
Findings – The research confirms that consumers adopt risk coping strategies in time of food risk
concern and their coping strategies include marketing elements such as brand and quality assurance,
price reduction, availability in all stores and endorsement from an independent organization.
Practical implications – The framework helps marketers to predict the effect of their marketing
plan by incorporating consumers’ risk coping strategies, in turn to improve consumers’ purchase
intention when perceived food safety risk exists.
Originality/value – This research demonstrates how marketers can incorporate marketing
strategies in a consumer risk coping framework, in order to provide an insight for the industry to
evaluate the effectiveness of their marketing strategies in times of food safety concern.
Keywords Consumer behaviour, Food safety, Marketing strategy, Food safety risk,
Risk coping strategy, Logistic regression
Paper type Research paper

British Food Journal
Vol. 114 No. 1, 2012
pp. 40-53
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0007-070X
DOI 10.1108/00070701211197356
Food safety has become an important criterion for consumer food choice. Some argue
that there may be a negative effect on the food market due to concern for the food
safety risk issue; an example of this is the outbreak of avian flu among poultry, which
brought down the sales of Bernard Matthews’[1] products by 17 percent (Tiltman,
2007). The significant drop of beef products is also a remarkable example (MAFF,
2000). The food industry and marketers have experienced great challenges when the
food market is fuelled with concern over the composition of food, such as chemicals
used in food production, microbiological contamination and so forth (Pugh, 1990).
Following a belief, many food marketers attempt to reduce the price in order to recover
the declined market in short term and/or promote the quality assurance to restore
consumer confidence in long term. As the food industry tends to adopt all possible
alternatives to save the market, which marketing strategy is more effective among
others in particular when several marketing strategies are adopted?
 Correspondingly, research suggests that consumers have a set of preferences to Food safety
coping with the unresolved perceived risk (Yeung and Morris, 2001). Their preferences concern
are driven by the possibility of reducing their perception of food safety risk, for
example to choose a product with a well known brand, celebrity endorsement,
money-back guarantee and so forth (Yeung and Yee, 2003). The context of their study
mainly focuses on a general purchase situation such as new product development or
brand extension. Little attention has been directed toward the food safety issue. Hence, 41
there is a need for the food industry to have a systematic strategy in time of food safety
concern.
Understanding consumers’ risk coping strategies would significantly help
industries to develop effective marketing strategies. An effective marketing strategic
plan, utilizing the right proportion of the marketing elements at the time of food safety
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concern can restore the declining sales due to (the) loss of consumer confidence in the
defective food product (Heerde et al., 2007). To achieve this, the industry should
understand how consumers respond to different marketing strategies solely or
corporately in order to develop a strategic plan which can meet consumers’ preferences.
However, there is a dearth of knowledge of how effective these marketing strategies are
in times of food safety concern. Nevertheless, little research so far seeks to utilize the
existing information in formulating a marketing programme. Even less research links
marketing strategies with risk coping strategies on consumer purchase decision during
perceived food safety risk exists.
This study aims to examine how the incorporation of marketing elements into
consumer risk coping strategies affects consumer purchase decision during periods of
food safety concern. As the poultry market has been frustrated due to the frequent
occurrence of contamination with Salmonella, and the recent H5N1 avian flu, chicken
meat product was chosen in the study to assess the usefulness of the marketing
strategies on consumer purchase in time of food safety concern.

Marketing strategies and marketing mix

Hoover et al. (1978) suggest that marketing strategies should include ways of reducing
pre-decision risk to reduce the concern for making an important purchase or frequent
purchases. The most common controllable tactical marketing tools for producing
desirable market response in a target market is the “marketing mix” (Van Waterschoot
and Van den Bulte, 1992). McCarthy’s four-Ps framework (product, price, place and
promotion) is one of the traditional classifications of the marketing mix, and it
dominates (among) all other classifications, such as the goods and services mix, the
distribution (mix) and (the) communication mix (Lazer et al., 1973), the addition of
packaging as the fifth P (Nickels and Jolson, 1976), the inclusion of public relations
(Mindak and Fine, 1981) (and) the addition of people (Judd, 1987), and so forth. Kent
(1986) describes the four-Ps of the marketing mix “as the holy quadruple of the
marketing faith written in tablets of stone”. The four-Ps framework is popular in
marketing literature and becomes an indisputable paradigm in academic research. The
framework has been widely adopted by marketing practitioners since its introduction
because of the simplicity and practicality of its basic principles (e.g. Coviello et al.,
2000; Zinkhan and Williams, 2007). Though marketing strategies which address
product, price, place and promotion are widely used by firms to produce the response it
wants in the target market, is this marketing strategic plan still a tactical marketing
 BFJ tool in time of food safety concern? Does the product characteristic, price factor, place
114,1 attribute or promotion tool help to relieve consumer risk perception? Which factor is
the most useful method for risk reduction?
Despite this, the system has received increasing criticism because of its unclear
specification of each category; this includes the standard of four-Ps being too limited
and the question of internal orientation (Schultz, 2001), lack of consumer interactivity
42 (Yudelson, 1999) and it is irrelevant to retention-based marketing (Gronroos, 1997), etc.
No doubt, the elements of the marketing mix appear to overlap with each other when
used in the interrelated nature of marketing activities, but it is to be relevant for
consumer marketing (Dickson and Ginter, 1987; Rafiq and Ahmed, 1995). Thus, this
study seeks to develop a measurement instrument that references the elements of
marketing mix and attempt to examine the effectiveness of each marketing strategy
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when the strategies are implemented individually and corporately from the perspective
of consumers.

Risk coping and marketing strategies

Consumers often develop some strategies to reduce the threat of various kinds of loss
from a purchase. Consumer confidence is likely to be restored, if food suppliers can
build strong economic and social ties by promising and consistently delivering
high-quality products, fair price, convenience of place and effective promotion
corresponding to consumer risk coping strategies. Some researchers suggested several
methods of risk reducers, such as endorsements, brand loyalty, major brand image,
private testing, store image, free sample, money-back guarantee, government testing,
and word of mouth in a general purchase situation (e.g. Roselius, 1971; Mitchell and
Prince, 1993; Yeung et al., 2010). Previous research indicates that choice among risk
reducers for those products which are dangerous to one’s health or safety regarding
hazard loss is comparatively limited (Yeung and Morris, 2001). Brand, quality
assurance and price are likely to link with subsequent purchase after the outbreak of a
food scare. Pugh (1990) opines that customer concern for food safety changes with
time. There are a lot of changes in technology development and in society over the last
two decades. Consumers’ attitude towards the risk reducers may not be limited to those
mentioned previously. It appears that these risk reducers could reference the four-Ps
category; that is product, price, place and promotion.

Risk coping strategy references to product

According to Kotler et al. (1996), the product would be in three levels: the core product,
the actual product and the augmented product. The core product stands for the core
benefits that consumers seek when they buy a product. The actual product may refer to
quality level, design features, brand name and packaging. The augmented product
may include additional consumer services and benefits such as product guarantee or a
free phone number to call if they have problems. As consumers often demand to know
the quality attributes during periods of food safety concern, product quality becomes a
main attribute in food choice for meat. The importance of brand is stated in a study of
hazardous and harmful food risk (Yeung and Yee, 2003). Brand provides a cue for
product quality in the evaluation of superior or inferior products, because it represents
the promise given by the company for its quality, trust and value. Consumer purchase
decision is shown to be guided by the extent to which alternative brands meet certain
 evaluative criteria. So, brand image and quality mark, as well as the product passing Food safety
government or private testing, and product traceability could be treated as concern
product-related strategies. Since perceived product quality and brand image
indirectly influence purchase intentions (Keiningham et al., 2005), brand and quality
assurance are chosen for the risk coping strategy referencing product.

Risk coping strategy references to price 43

Ahmed and Rafiq (1995) propose that price is a balance between utility/value against
cost for both company and individual. Price can affect consumer decision in a purchase
since the consumer perceives exchange something of value – the price to get
something of value i.e. the benefits (Kotler and Keller, 2006). Thus, price is a crucial
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factor for consumer purchase. Verma and Varma (2003) opine that price is relatively
speaking the flexible elements to change compared to other marketing mix elements.
Companies very often adjust the basic price of a product to account for various
customer differences and changing situations (Hunt, 2005). Price promotion is viewed
as better value to the consumer in the general situation, since low price probably helps
to attract customers (Fleischmann et al., 2004, Yee et al., 2005). The most common
method is price reduction for a particular product when the demand drops. This
phenomenon is true when the demand for the offended product declines after the
outbreak of food scares (Yeung and Yee, 2003). Price reduction has been extensively
used by marketers during periods of food scare. Many major companies cut prices by a
third or even half of the original price in order to reward consumer responses. Other
research has found that money back guarantees also useful, but there was very little
effect on consumer purchase for the product associated with food hazard (Yeung and
Yee, 2003).

Risk coping strategy references to place

Mitchell (1998) states that the type of store as well as its location and atmosphere may
be determinants affecting risk perceptions, and then to consumer purchase decision.
Store attributes can include the cleanliness of the store, feelings of safety, quality of the
food and post-transaction satisfaction, as well as staff service, staff knowledge and the
reputation of the store (Mitchell, 1998). These attributes however, do not guarantee to
reduce perceived food safety risk. As most consumers do not have sufficient
information to measure the food risk themselves, they depend on the retailer to provide
safe and good quality products. Food sold by all the major shops is considered safe
because the product would often be recalled if a defect is found. Thus, the store
attributes refer to availability in all stores signalling the food is safe to consume and
this serves as a risk coping strategy which influences purchase decision (Yeung and
Yee, 2003).

Risk coping strategy references to promotion

Promotion consists of a specific blend of advertising, personal selling, sales promotion
and public relations. These methods include some form of non-personal presentation or
oral presentation, short-term incentives to encourage the purchase or building good
relations through favourable publicity (Kotler and Keller, 2006). However, the more the
consumers perceived risk in buying a product, in particular when information is
lacking, the greater the propensity to use word of mouth (Pocharski and Jacobson,
 BFJ 2007). People who are used to word of mouth information are those who are physically
114,1 close and considered to be credible or knowledgeable (Ali, 1999). The consumer may
also infer approval from a third party as a standard measure for safety and
wholesomeness of the food product, due to asymmetry of knowledge about the product.
Hence, the government laboratory approval/endorsement is found to be an effective
promotional technique for ensuring the quality of the chicken meat (Yeung and Yee,
44 2003). So, endorsement from an independent organization serves as a risk coping
strategy referencing promotion in this study.
From the review of literature, the following hypotheses are developed:
H1. There is a positive relationship between the risk coping strategy referencing
brand and quality assurance, and consumer purchase decision.
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H2. There is a positive relationship between the risk coping strategy referencing
price reduction and consumer purchase decision.
H3. There is a positive relationship between the risk coping strategy referencing
availability in all stores and consumer purchase decision.
H4. There is a positive relationship between the risk coping strategy referencing
endorsement from an independent organization and consumer purchase
decision.

Methods
Focusing on food safety risk, a quantitative study was conducted to test the
applicability of a mix of marketing strategies, and how they work together to reduce
the food scare perceived among consumers. Questionnaire with structured,
closed-ended questions was administered to a convenience sample of 216
respondents aged between 16 and 70 years in different places, on different days and
at different times of the day, to minimize any over-representation. The break down of
their demographic characteristics is shown in Table I.

Characteristics Number of respondents Percentage

Age group
16-34 83 38.4
35-54 86 39.8
55-70 47 21.8
Gender
Male 105 48.6
Female 111 51.4
Education background
Degree holder 61 28.2
Non-degree holder 155 71.8
Income group
Table I. Below £15,000 pa 85 39.4
Characteristics of £15,000-29,999 pa 77 35.6
respondents £30,000 pa or above 54 25
 In order to test the hypotheses and determine consumer purchase of fresh chicken Food safety
meat, a self-administrative questionnaire was specially designed which contained a concern
choice of a “yes” or “no” response on all possible combinations (see the Appendix,
Table AI), i.e. 15 conditions, either each risk coping strategy stands alone or combines
with other risk coping strategies together with purchase decision of chicken meat
product on the 15 conditions in case of food safety concern. The independent
variables/predictors are the four risk coping strategies and the dependent variable is 45
purchase decision (either purchase or not purchase). In each case, both independent and
dependent variables are dichotomous (i.e. either 1 or 0). The design of the questionnaire
addressed the effect of each risk coping strategy either implemented alone or combined
from all possible combinations. The odds of each risk coping strategy to consumer food
purchase decision can be obtained by performing logistic regression to achieve the
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research aim. Logistic regression is applied, as it is particularly appropriate in

estimating a discrete outcome (purchase or non-purchase) from a set of binary
predictors, which are linearly related (Tansey et al., 1996; Tabachnick and Fidell, 2007,
pp. 437-9). The probability of success (i.e. purchase) is affected by the independent
variables (i.e. brand and quality assurance, price reduction, available to all major super
stores, and endorsed by an independent organization). Measures of the instantaneous
rate of change in the probability of occurrence of a response (purchase or not purchase),
and prediction of consumer purchase from the predictors with change in a given
predictor, is determined (Demaris, 1990).
In addition, logistic regression is able to estimate the individual and also the
combined effects when more than one risk coping strategies (treated as predictor) is
employed simultaneously (Hosmer and Lemeshow, 2000). In this study, 15 conditions
were formulated to reflect the number of optimal possible combination of the four risk
coping strategies (see the Appendix). Each of the 15 conditions for each respondent
was transformed in binary form as a case scenario. As a result, 3,240 case scenarios (15
conditions £ 216 respondents) were entered into SPSS for analysis.
Thus, a hypothesized model was developed for this study with the following
definition:

Ln½pj =ð1 2 pj Þ
¼ A þ SBj X ij

where pj is the estimated probability of the jth case (j ¼ 1; :::::; 3; 240) in one of the
conditions with constant A, coefficients Bi, and predictors, Xi ði ¼ 1, 2, 3 and 4).
Maximum likelihood was used to estimate the coefficients, and the purpose was to
find the optimal combination of predictors to maximize consumer purchase.
Chi-squared distribution was checked for the difference between their log-likelihood
of the null model and the hypothetical model, and the Wald test was used for testing
the significance of individual independent variables. Classification table was checked
to assess the success of the model and to evaluate the accuracy of the prediction as it
produced the probability of accurate classification for the presence/absence of the
strategy and the overall pooled rate of all sample cases across both of those
representing the presence or absence of a certain type of strategy (Tabachnick and
Fidell, 2007). Furthermore, the resultant model which shows the linear portion of the
equation for the four predictors (A þ B1 X1 þ B2 X2 þ B3 X3 þ B4 X4 ) is not the end in
itself, but it creates the logit or log of the odds where the odds of a particular outcome
for each independent variable can be determined (Hosmer and Lemeshow, 2000).
 BFJ Results – risk coping marketing strategies
114,1 A logistic regression model was developed to study consumer purchase decision of
chicken meat relating to food safety risk. Four risk coping strategies, namely “Brand and
Quality Assurance”, “Price Reduction”, “Availability in All Stores” and “Endorsement
from an Independent Organization” were treated as independent variables, and
“Purchase” as a dependent variable were utilised to build this framework. All variables
46 including independent and dependent variables were in binary form; “1” represented “the
present of individual strategy” or “purchase”, whereas “0” represented “without
strategy” or “no purchase” in all 3,240 case scenarios.
Estimation terminated at iteration number 4 because Log likelihood decreased by
less than 0.001. Omnibus test was used to test if the framework with these four
independent variables was significantly different from the null model, which is to test
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the capability of all independent variables in the model jointly to predict the dependent
variable. As shown in Table II, Chi-square was 842.387 with degree of freedom equals 4
and p-value less than 0.001 suggesting that there is adequate fit of the data to the model
which implied that there is at least one of the independent variables is significantly
related to the dependent variable.
A classification table was created to evaluate the classification of cases which fit the
model when predict the outcome. As shown in Table III, the overall accuracy of this
risk reduction framework to predict consumer purchase decision of chicken meat
product under the concern of food safety risk equals 70.86 percent, while the sensitivity
(the correct predicted rate for purchase) and the specificity (i.e. the correct predicted
rate for not purchase) were 71.68 percent (i.e. 1,296/1,808) and 69.83 percent (i.e.
1,000/1,432) respectively with a positive predictive value of 75 percent (i.e. 1,296/1,728)
and negative predictive value of 66.13 percent (i.e. 1,000/1,512), using the default cut
value of 0.5. In other words, 1,296 cases was correctly classified as purchase on the
basis of adopting the risk coping strategies, namely “Brand and quality assurance”,
“Price reduction”, “Availability in all stores” and “Endorsement from an independent
organization” while 1,000 cases was correctly predicted as non-purchase decision.

Chi-square Df Significance

Table II. Model 842.387 4 0.0000

Goodness of fit test of the Block 842.387 4 0.0000
risk coping model Step 842.387 4 0.0000

Predicted purchase
Observed 0 1 Percentage correct

Purchase
Table III. 0 1,000 432 69.83
Classification table 1 512 1,296 71.68
assessing the success of Overall percentage correct 70.86
the model for consumer
purchase Note: The cut value is 0.50
 For testing individual strategy, the estimated coefficients (in logistic regression) of the Food safety
predictors provided by the Wald test were assessed. As a result of analysing the concern
variables in the equation, all strategies are significant at the 95 percent confident level,
with p , 0:001. The odds (Exp(B)) for the “Brand and quality assurance”, “Price
reduction”, “Availability in all stores” and “Endorsement from an independent
organization” risk coping strategies are 6.0823, 1.2683, 2.2088 and 5.7379 respectively
(Table IV).From these results, the framework was produced as follows:
p
47
ln 12pj j ¼ 2 2.1283 þ 1.8054 £ “Brand and quality assurance” þ 0.2377 £
i
“Price reduction”, þ 0.7925 £ “Availability in all stores” þ 1.7471 £ “Endorsement
from an independent organization”
This indicates that by implementing “Brand and quality assurance” strategy, there
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will be an increase in the odds of a consumer purchasing chicken meat by 6.0823 times
[odds ratio ¼ exp(1.8054) ¼ 6.0823]. Similarly, by implementing the “Price reduction” ,
the “Availability in all stores” and “Endorsement from an independent organization”
strategies, there will be an increase in the odds of a consumer purchasing chicken meat
by 1.2683 times [odds ratio ¼ exp(0.2377) ¼ 1.2683], 2.2088 times [odds
ratio ¼ exp(0.7925) ¼ 2.2088], 5,7379 times [odds ratio ¼ exp(1.7471) ¼ 5.7379]
respectively.

Discussion
From the results of the preceding analysis, the four variables (namely) “Brand and
quality assurance”, “Price reduction”, “Availability in all stores” and “Endorsement
from an independent organization” have both an individual effect and combined effect
with the presence of the other risk coping strategies. The addition or subtraction of one
risk coping strategy would affect the others, as well as consumer purchase decision.
Marketers should take all risk coping strategies into consideration when they develop
marketing strategies or resource allocation on each marketing strategy if there is a food
safety concern.
“Brand and quality assurance” has the relatively highest effects (6.0823) on
consumer purchase. This finding is consistent with other studies that ‘Brand’ in
general is the most effective risk coping strategy adopted by consumers when a risk is
perceived. This finding suggests that well known, popular brands give consumers
reassurance in terms of quality as quality assurance is a key element of brand identity.
Yet, a transparency system of the assurance schemes that consumers are being
informed of, including its standard and procedures is required. As brand could provide
an image of added value and quality assurance, the food industry should aim to
improve their brand equity by adding a guarantee of quality and promote the brand
value of their products to gain favourable response from the consumer and the media.
“Endorsement from an independent organization” comes next to product with an
effect of 5.7379. This is in line with past research in food safety risk with endorsement
from independent organizations, such as the Food Standard Agency, or Meat and
Livestock Commission; this is particularly useful (Yeung and Yee, 2003). As suggested
by Dev and Schultz (2002), the promotional mix is moving away from a mere message
delivery to integration with relevant information in order to differentiate company’s
products and their benefit. Thus, information, such as storage guidelines, methods of
reheating, specific handling instructions and even health information or food safety tips
are well received by consumers (Martin, 1997). A clear and consistent message through
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48
BFJ
114,1

Table IV.

consumer purchase
risk coping strategies on
logistic regression) of the
Estimated coefficients (in
95 percent CI for
Exp(B)
Variable Coefficient B S.E. Exp(B) Lower Upper Wald df p-value

Brand and quality assurance 1.8054 0.0885 6.0823 5.1134 7.2347 415.8887 1 0.0000
Price reduction 0.2377 0.0817 1.2683 1.0806 1.4886 8.4636 1 0.0036
Availability in all stores 0.7925 0.0834 2.2088 1.8757 2.6011 90.2850 1 0.0000
Endorsement from an independent organization 1.7471 0.0884 5.7379 4.8249 6.8237 390.3725 1 0.0000
Constant 2 2.1283 0.1141 347.9815 1 0.0000
Note: Dependent variable: consumer purchase
 labels or quality marks is particularly crucial to relieve the food safety concern. A Food safety
standardized quality mark under a national “umbrella” scheme is recommended to avoid concern
dissipated marketing effort, because too many symbols and quality marks supported by
different sources may confuse consumers. No doubt, there is room to improve the
common welfare by providing information for wider food choice, in turn, to enhance the
willingness to purchase. Future research is required to help determine the best way to
put through the message of these quality marks to consumers. 49
“Availability in all stores” strategy comes in third place with an effect of 2.2088. The
underlying principle refers to confidence in the credibility of the big companies, in
addition to the suitable purpose of using the transference process of building trust (Yee
et al., 2005). One possible explanation may be due to the big supermarkets often
recalling or withdrawing the faulty products when a crisis arises. This implies that the
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consumer is likely to purchase food products from those they trust, particularly during
periods of food safety concern.
“Price reduction”, strategy has relatively little effect (1.2683) in this study on food
safety risk. The result shows that consumers may be willing to trade-off risk against a
discounted price. This supports the major supermarkets’ use of price discounts or
special offers to improve sales and/or maintain purchases during periods of poor
consumer confidence in a product. However, the small effect of price is not that
important compared to the other marketing mix elements or because of the
controversies on the price-quality relationship among academics for decades
(e.g. Monroe, 1973; Erevelles, 1993). A study of consumer perception on food safety
risk shows that consumers are willing to pay a little extra for premium food, such as
free-range chicken against some favoured special offers to offset the food risk. This
warrants a further investigation on the relationship between price and perceived
quality of a food product in terms of food safety.

Conclusion and implications

This study confirms that consumers adopt risk coping strategies in time of food safety
risk and their risk coping strategies could be referenced to marketing mix elements. By
using logistic regression, a consumer food risk coping framework was successfully
developed. The framework helps marketers to evaluate the effectiveness of their
marketing strategies in the context of hazardous food risk in chicken meat as consumer
would reference the marketing mix elements for reducing perceived food safety risk.
The framework shows the importance of identifying the effect of each risk coping
strategy(ies) to the food suppliers when allocating their resources and withdrawing
funds from inefficient mediums. The results derived from the study should be
interpreted with caution because the use of a convenience sampling method may not
reflect the intention of the whole population. Moreover, the small sample size may not
detect a small change in risk coping strategy usage. One area that deserves attention is
how the safety awareness impacts consumer behaviour and the current food market.
Further studies should aim to acquire more precise measurements and elements of each
risk coping strategy, which could be included separately in the framework. This
framework is likely to be applicable to other aspects, such as consumer perception risk
of product line stretching, brand extension, as well as products in other industries.
In addressing consumers’ concern, the food industry could benefit from exploring
consumer risk perception and how consumers reduce their perceived food risk in
 BFJ response to marketing strategies, such as product design regarding microbiological
114,1 features, promotion supported by independent reliable source, and distribution system
through the major super stores, as well as pricing in terms of special offers or premium
prices. This study investigates the impact of risk coping strategies, which reflects the
importance of maintaining a high quality standard, the provision of relevant
information to ensure food safety, and the question of consumer concern. Quality
50 marks from Assured Chicken Production (ACP) and British Poultry Council (BPC)
which provide evidence of tight control over all stages of production from farm
through to processing, can indicate a sign of high quality standard to the consumer.
Industry might make use of the brand value to promote a guarantee of safety, which
builds up consumer confidence. Association with industry initiatives such as the Food
and Drink Federation and Food Standard Agency, would be effective in promoting
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food safety. It is recommended that press statements be released by the in-trade

association during periods of concern about food safety. Furthermore, a mutual benefit
for the food industry and consumers should be to aim for an overall marketing purpose
of maintaining a high quality standard; this would help the ongoing maintenance of
confidence in food safety, any emergency response during food safety concern, and the
remedial procedure to rebuild confidence after a food safety alert. By using the risk
coping framework, the industry should not only emphasis the mere tactical issues but
also create value through understanding the individual strategies in order to address
consumer concern of food safety issue.

Note
1. Bernard Matthews a British farm and food company specialises in farming turkeys.

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Appendix

Risk coping Brand and quality Price Available in Endorsement from an

strategy/Scenario assurance reduction all stores independent organization

a. £
b. £ £
c. £ £ £ £
d. £ £ £
e. £ £
f. £
g. £ £ £
h. £ £
i. £ £
j. £
k. £ £ £
l. £ £
m. £ £
n. £ Table AI.
o. £ £ £ The 15 possible
combinations of risk
Note: £ indicates the presence of the risk coping strategy for each scenario coping strategies

Corresponding author
Ruth Yeung can be contacted at: ruth@ift.edu.mo

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