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Consumer evaluation of unbranded and unlabelled food products:

The case of bacalhau

Article  in  European Journal of Marketing · February 2009

DOI: 10.1108/03090560910923300

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Consumer
Consumer evaluation of evaluation of
unbranded and unlabelled food bacalhau
products
213
The case of bacalhau
Received April 2007
Geir Sogn-Grundvåg and Jens Østli Revised September 2007
Department of Strategy, Economics and Marketing, Accepted September 2007
Norwegian Institute of Fisheries and Aquaculture Research, Tromsø, Norway

Abstract
Purpose – This study sets out to explore how consumers evaluate unbranded and unlabelled food
products and to what extent they are able to select the products with the highest potential to meet their
expectations regarding eating quality.
Design/methodology/approach – The study focused on Portuguese consumers and their purchase
of bacalhau, i.e. salted and dried cod, which is sold unpacked, unbranded and unlabelled in
supermarkets. The collection of data encompassed observations of shoppers in supermarkets,
individual interviews and focus groups with consumers, and a consumer panel that conducted quality
assessments and rankings of nine different bacalhaus and subsequent taste assessments of the same
products following desalting and cooking.
Findings – Results indicate that Portuguese consumers – in spite of substantial experience with
buying, preparing and consuming bacalhau – are uncertain in their in-store quality assessment.
Shoppers used multiple criteria to assess the quality of the bacalhau, such as the appearance and
dryness of the product. Some rather curious quality criteria that were not related to “objective” product
quality were also discerned. Touching the dried and salted cod trying to “feel” the quality was
common. Some even broke the fish tail to assess the dryness. Findings from the consumer panel
showed large discrepancies between how the same products were assessed before and after desalting
and cooking.
Research limitations/implications – The study is limited to one food product and one national
market. Marketing implications, such as focus on packaging, quality labelling, and branding are
discussed, as well as implications for future research.
Originality/value – The paper shows that although unlabelled and unbranded food products are
common, relatively little research addressing how consumers assess such products in a wider sense,
including which strategies consumers apply and to what extent they are able to select products that
meet or exceed their expectations regarding eating quality, has been conducted. The paper also
addresses the role cultural rules and rituals may play in the assessment of traditional food products
such as bacalhau.
Keywords Food products, Consumers, Portugal
Paper type Research paper

Introduction
This paper explores questions of how consumers evaluate and select unpacked, European Journal of Marketing
Vol. 43 No. 1/2, 2009
unbranded, and unlabelled food products – and the extent to which they are able to pp. 213-228
select products that will meet their expectations regarding eating quality. These are q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0309-0566
important questions, because for such products consumers are provided with little or DOI 10.1108/03090560910923300
EJM no information at points-of-sale. Self-service counters for fruit and vegetables are
43,1/2 relevant examples. Here, the usual information provided is price (and sometimes brand
and/or origin). There is typically no information about flavour, nutritional content,
health benefits, or other types of more or less persuasive information that might assist
consumers in making their choice. Other examples are unbranded and unlabelled fresh
meat and seafood. In order to find a product that will meet or exceed expectations
214 regarding desirable attributes such as flavour and freshness customers must base their
choices on the appearance of the product. In some instances, such as with fresh fruit
and vegetables, products can be touched to “feel” the quality (Peck and Childers, 2006).
In addition, customers may ask trained staff for assistance when this is available.
An intriguing question is extent to which unassisted consumers are able to select
unlabelled and unbranded food products that provide them with the most satisfying
eating experience, just by looking and sometimes touching the products in the shop.
This is an interesting question, because past research indicates that consumers are
poor judges of the quality of certain types of products, such as fresh, unbranded and
unlabelled meat (Grunert et al., 2004) and fresh seafood (Anderson and Anderson, 1991;
Verbeke et al., 2007). For example, Steenkamp and Van Trijp (1996) found that the
correlation between expected and experienced quality of meat (blade steak) was low.
Similarly, in a study of consumers’ perceptions and experiences with the quality of
pork meat, Bredahl et al. (1998) found that experienced eating quality was only
moderately related to expected quality. Both studies focused on intrinsic quality
attributes, such as colour and texture of the meat.
Few studies have addressed, in a wider sense, how consumers assess the quality of
unlabelled and unbranded food products, for instance by exploring which strategies
consumers apply when assessing and purchasing unbranded and unlabelled food
products. For example, to what extent do consumers touch and smell products in the
supermarket? To what extent do they rely on visual inspection (e.g. the appearance of
meat)? Do they learn from their own or others’ experiences in assessing quality? And,
to what extent are such strategies useful in terms of selecting the products with the
highest potential of meeting expectations? Another interesting aspect that has been
marginally addressed in previous research is whether consumers, in their product
assessment, are influenced by the food culture of which they are a part. Askegaard and
Madsen (1995) demonstrate that a number of different culinary cultures exist across
Europe. Is it possible that different rules and rituals for how to assess food products
have developed over time – just as different procedures and recipes for cooking have?
In this paper we explore how Portuguese consumers evaluate and select bacalhau, i.e.
cod that has been gutted, headed, and split along the backbone before being salted and
dried (see Plate 1 for an illustration of the product). There are several reasons for our
choice of this particular product and context. First, in Portugal bacalhau is sold
unbranded and unlabelled in stacks in the supermarket. The customer selects one or
more bacalhaus (usually using bare hands) and a shop assistant weighs, cuts, and packs
the salted and dried fish. Usually, the only information provided at the point of sale is
price and weight category. Second, because bacalhau is a natural product, there is no
standard piece – they all vary to some extent, e.g. in shape, thickness, colour, dryness,
and size, within each weight category. This variation means that to some extent
bacalhau may, after desalting and cooking, vary in colour, flavour, texture, and/or other
attributes. Desalting is done by the consumers at home by soaking the bacalhau in water
 Consumer
evaluation of
bacalhau

215

Plate 1.
A bacalhau before soaking
and cooking

for 24-72 hours (depending on its thickness) to make it edible. This procedure reduces the
salt content and increases the water content of the bacalhau dramatically. Soaking it for
too long will wash out key components, influencing the colour, texture, and flavour of the
cooked bacalhau. Not soaking it long enough will result in a product that is too salty.
These factors contribute to the difficulty of assessing the eating quality simply based on
product assessment in the supermarket. Finally, bacalhau represents an extremely
popular – if not the most popular – food item in Portuguese cuisine, dating back several
centuries (Abel and Consiglieri, n.d.). Today, the average consumption of bacalhau is one
meal per week. Arguably, bacalhau is as important to Portuguese culture and identity as
pasta is to Italians (Dalli and Romani, 2007). Such significance indicates a high level of
involvement and that many consumers are very experienced at evaluating and
purchasing bacalhau. It also indicates that cultural rules and rituals for assessing
bacalhau might have developed over time.
The remaining part of the paper is organized as follows. In the next section, we
draw mainly on literature concerning assessment of food quality, marketing, food
culture, and psychology to provide theory-based insights relating to consumer
evaluation and the selection of unbranded and unlabelled food products. We then
present our research methodology. After this, results are presented, and finally we
discuss our findings and highlight their limitations and implications.

Theoretical insights
It is well known that consumers experience difficulties when judging the quality of
many food products, particularly when they are unbranded and unlabelled (Anderson
and Anderson, 1991; Grunert, 1997; Grunert et al., 1996, 2004; Juhl and Poulsen, 2000).
EJM Consumer efforts to evaluate food product quality can be categorised according to
43,1/2 characteristics of search, experience, and credence (see, e.g. Anderson and Anderson,
1991; Grunert, 1997). Search characteristics are quality attributes that consumers can
assess prior to purchase, such as price, appearance, size, thickness, and colour.
Experience characteristics are quality dimensions that can only be evaluated after
purchase, i.e. once they are experienced (Nelson, 1970). Quality dimensions, such as
216 flavour and texture, can only be discovered and judged by eating. Credence
characteristics refer to attributes that cannot normally be evaluated, even after
purchase and use (Darby and Karni, 1973). For example, it is normally impossible for
consumers to verify that a food product has been produced in an organic way or with
respect to animal welfare. Thus, credence characteristics refer to the credibility of the
seller vis-à-vis the buyer (Grunert, 1997).
When purchasing unbranded and unlabelled food products in a retail store,
consumers can usually judge by visual inspection various product characteristics, such
as colour, shape, size, and general appearance. Consumers may also rely on additional
senses to evaluate products. For example, the ripeness of an avocado can be assessed
by carefully pressing the fruit in an attempt to sense the softness of the pulp. In the
case of bacalhau, consumers may smell the product and they are allowed to physically
touch the bacalhaus to “feel” the quality. The extent to which smell and touch is helpful
to consumers in their search for the best product is unclear, but past research shows
that touch may influence behaviour. For example, Crusco and Wetzel (1984) found that
restaurant customers that were touched by waiters offered more generous tips than
those that were not touched. Also, in a recent study of consumers purchasing
nectarines and peaches in a US supermarket, Peck and Childers (2006) found that
touching the products positively influenced impulse purchasing. It should be noted
that the sensory stimulation experienced through touching the products might enhance
consumers’ shopping experiences (Holbrook and Hirschman, 1982).
However, while touching products may induce some consumers to buy a product,
touching products may also have a negative influence. In an intriguing article, Argo
et al. (2006) demonstrate how consumers – even though they enjoy touching products
themselves – respond negatively when other consumers have touched the same
products. The authors refer to this as “consumer contamination” and suggest that this
effect could be most prevalent for food products where products may be objectively
harmed (e.g. become soiled or dirty) as a result of consumer contact.
Even though consumers can judge products by vision, smell, and touch prior to
purchase, they are not able to assess important experience attributes such as flavour
and texture. It should be noted that this may in some cases be achieved by providing
taste samples, but such an approach is normally not possible for products that need to
be cooked before consumption. Credence attributes cannot be evaluated at all and this
may create uncertainty among consumers that can lead to the use of surrogate
indicators or cues in product evaluations (Grunert et al., 2004; Oude Ophuis and Van
Trijp, 1995; Steenkamp, 1990). In their review of research on consumer evaluations of
fresh meat, for example, Grunert et al. (2004) show that consumers base their judgment
of meat quality primarily on its appearance – and that this often causes them to
misjudge eating quality. An interesting question is whether consumers through
extensive experience are able to learn how to find the “best” product and, if so, which
criteria they use to do so?
 Theoretical perspectives from cognitive psychology provide some insight into how Consumer
consumers may try to find the best unbranded and unlabelled food product. For evaluation of
example, it is well established that people’s ability to remember objects precisely the
way they are is limited. Instead, people tend to focus on and remember more general bacalhau
features, such as the shape, colour, and size of objects (Galotti, 1994). In addition,
people tend to pay more attention to and remember events, objects, or features that are
salient, i.e. they “stand out” in some way (Fiske and Taylor, 1991). It seems likely that 217
consumers through experience develop beliefs about salient product features that are
regarded appropriate indicators of desired product quality. In the case of a traditional
unbranded and unlabelled product such as bacalhau that has been bought more or less
in the same form for centuries, consumer experience and the level of involvement
should be substantial. It seems likely that such experience, over time, has become part
of cultural rules and rituals for how to assess bacalhau.
A highly relevant question is whether the emphasised features or attributes actually
are useful indicators of eating quality. We ask this because research suggests that
learning from experience may not be straightforward (e.g. Brehmer, 1980). One
explanation is that people tend to make causal inferences between occurrences
happening more or less simultaneously – and that such inferences may not be correct
(Fiske and Taylor, 1991; Harvey and Weary, 1984). For example, a consumer buys a
bacalhau that has certain characteristics, such as being white and dry, and it turns out
to taste very good. From this, the consumer may infer that the colour and dryness of
the bacalhau are the most important factors contributing to the good flavour. But the
good flavour of a white and dry piece of bacalhau does not necessarily mean that these
two characteristics of the bacalhau are directly related to its flavour. According to
attribution theory this way of making causal inferences is common and may explain
how consumers develop an understanding of what they believe is a good bacalhau.
However, due to the lack of previous research we know relatively little about which
kinds of product features consumers look for when purchasing unbranded and
unlabelled food products, which kinds of assessment strategies they apply, and
whether these are useful in terms of selecting the “right” product in the supermarket.
Our research described and reported in the following sections was designed to shed
light on these important questions.

Research method
In order to study how consumers evaluate and select an unbranded and unlabelled food
product, including to what extent they are able to find the product with the highest
potential to meet their expectations, we utilized several sources of primary data. More
specifically, our research included observations of shoppers in supermarkets,
individual interviews, and focus groups with consumers. In addition, a consumer
panel conducted taste assessments of nine different bacalhaus and also ranked the
same products before they were prepared and cooked.
Observations of shoppers in supermarkets were conducted informally by standing
next to stacks of bacalhau and simply watch how a number of customers made their
selections. The purpose here was to obtain an initial understanding of the way
consumers evaluate bacalhau at points-of-sale, including how long they spent and
whether they touched and smelled the products as part of their product evaluation. The
observations were conducted in ten different supermarkets in Portugal.
EJM Individual interviews and focus groups were conducted to gain further insight into
43,1/2 how consumers shop, prepare, and cook bacalhau, as well as which criteria they use to
assess and select products. In both the interviews and the focus groups we recruited
female consumers because in Portuguese homes females are usually responsible for
both shopping and cooking.
Individual interviews were conducted with 30 women in ten families. In each family,
218 the grandmother, her daughter, and her daughter’s daughter were interviewed. By this
approach, we aimed to reveal whether, and if so, how, skills related to assessment,
preparation, and cooking of bacalhau are passed on between generations. The
interviews were conducted in Portuguese, mostly in the homes of the subjects and the
participants were recruited using the network of a Portuguese female student. The
interviews focused on several topics related to bacalhau, including how/when they
started to eat and prepare bacalhau, who trained them, and what they perceived as the
most useful quality attributes when purchasing bacalhau.
The focus groups were conducted in Lisbon and Porto (two groups in Lisbon and
two in Porto). A total of 28 women participated. The groups were recruited and
moderated by a professional Portuguese agency. The main criterion for recruitment
was that the participating women were responsible for food purchases in the family, as
well as for desalting and cooking the bacalhau. The groups contained persons of
different ages and relationship status (i.e. both single person and multiple person
households). The discussion focused on eating habits, dietary concerns, bacalhau both
as a traditional and modern dish, where, when and how to buy bacalhau, and the
process of desalting bacalhau at home.
All interviews and focus groups were tape-recorded and transcribed. The
transcribed interviews were content-analysed by carefully inspecting the texts to
identify how the participating consumers assess and select bacalhau. In order to allow
the reader to assess our interpretations and conclusions, we report quotes from the
interviews (Kirk and Miller, 1986).
In the following we describe the consumer panel in more detail.

The consumer panel

The consumer panel was set up in Lisbon with 120 pre-recruited consumers
participating. In order to reveal whether experience made shoppers more capable to
select the best products, older, middle-aged, and young consumers were included,
based on the assumption that experience was related to age. Our observations of
shoppers showed that when couples were purchasing bacalhau, the male sometimes
would select the bacalhau. On this background, we aimed to put together a panel with
the following characteristics:
.
Each participant should have bought and prepared bacalhau at least once in the
last 30 days.
.
Half of the participants should be 50 years of age or older. The group aged 35-49
and the group aged 25-34 should each represent 25 percent of the participants.
.
About 20 percent of participants should be male, and 80 percent should be
female.
A professional recruiting company provided us with a panel with very similar
characteristics.
Panel set-up Consumer
The pre-recruited participants were organised in groups of ten. After a short evaluation of
introduction by a Portuguese co-worker they were led to the sensory laboratory. Here,
they were given a number tag making it possible to identify each participant bacalhau
throughout the whole test. Before the tasting session started they were asked to answer
a short questionnaire. This contained questions about age, consumption rate, where
they typically purchased, prepared, and ate bacalhau, and, finally, their perceived 219
competence in evaluating bacalhau quality at point-of-sale. After the tasting session
the participants were led back to the resting room where refreshments were available
and they were instructed about the ranking of the unpacked and unlabelled bacalhaus.
The participants were paid in cash before leaving. Each session with ten people lasted
for about 90 minutes. A total of 13 sessions were conducted over three days.

Preparation of products
Nine different products were tested, and the different bacalhaus were selected to reflect
the variation of bacalhaus available in the Portuguese market. This was done by using
four types of bacalhaus bought in supermarkets in Lisbon (these products were named
P1, P2, P3, and P4). Four bacalhaus were produced at a Norwegian research institute
(named F1, F3, F4, and F8) and the last bacalhau was bought from a producer of
traditional bacalhau in Norway (this product was named OLD). The latter product was
quite similar to a typical bacalhau found in the Portuguese market until about two
decades ago. All the products were made from Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua). The nine
bacalhaus were bought/produced in lots containing 20 fish each and all were in the
most popular size category in Portugal called “Crescido” (1.000-1.999 gms).

Tasting session
The participants were served hot and equally sized desalted pieces of bacalhau that
had been cooked in a professional kitchen steam oven for 12 minutes. The participants
were placed in separate boxes in the sensory laboratory and each assessor was asked
to give a score on a nine-point scale ranging from 1 ¼ “dislike extremely” (“detesto”) to
9 ¼ “I love it” (“adoro”). The midpoint of the scale was titled “neither like nor dislike”
(“Não gosto nem desgosto”). Each product was assessed on a separate sheet of paper
and the serving order for each participant was random to avoid carry-over effects (i.e.
that the assessment of one product might influence the assessment of the next). A
neutral (in flavour, colour, and salt content) “warming-up” sample was given as the
first sample to all participants. This was, however, not included in the study results.
Each participant was served pure water and neutral tasting crackers and was
requested to cleanse the palate between each sample. A spittoon was also provided.

Ranking of unpacked and unlabeled bacalhaus

Two separate rooms were prepared for the ranking session, making it possible for two
persons to do the ranking simultaneously. Each room contained two tables and the
nine bacalhaus were randomly piled on one. The other table was rectangular and the
participants were to place the bacalhaus along one side organized from best to least
liked. No instructions were given about how to do the ranking. This meant that all the
participants were forced to touch and move the products, resembling what happens in
a retail store. Each bacalhau was coded with a three-digit number different from the
EJM numbers used in the tasting session. After each participant had finished, the ranking
43,1/2 was registered and the bacalhaus were piled on the other table in random order being
ready for the next assessor.

Findings
In this section we present our findings. We start by reporting results from interviews and
220 focus groups regarding which quality criteria the interviewees focused on when assessing
the quality of bacalhau. After this, we report findings regarding how consumers assessed
bacalhau quality in supermarkets. Finally, findings from the panel study are reported.

Consumer quality criteria

During the interviews and focus groups we asked the participating consumers what, in
their opinion, characterised a good bacalhau. This question appeared to be somewhat
difficult to answer, and differences in quality perceptions between subjects were
revealed. The following quotes were typical:
It [the bacalhau] should be dry enough.
Not too thick.
Not too thin.
Quality means a nice appearance; dry and a yellowish colour.
Good taste, thick and white.
Bacalhau quality translates into a thick fish with a whitish colour, and it flakes[1].
An inspection of these quotes reveals several interesting observations. First, the quotes
indicate that bacalhau quality is multidimensional. It can also be seen that quality is
perceived partly differently among the subjects. For instance, preferences for the colour
of the bacalhau vary from some looking for a white product, some for a whitish
product, while others look for a slightly yellowish bacalhau.
Second, some of the quality criteria are rather vague, indicating that they are
difficult to express verbally. For example, exactly how thick is a bacalhau that is “not
too thick”, “not too thin”, or “thick”? Probably the only way for these consumers to
specify exactly what they mean is by using a ruler to measure the thickness of a
bacalhau with the desired thickness. This indicates that there is something tacit about
quality assessment of bacalhau, which in turn implies that learning about such
assessment is best done when a novice carefully watches the quality assessment of an
expert in situ, i.e. the novice follows a person mastering the skill while she or he
assesses bacalhau in the supermarket (Polanyi, 1967). This learning strategy was
confirmed by the individual interviews with three generations of women when they
were asked how they learned to select the “right” bacalhau. The typical answer we got
was that they had observed what their mother did when she evaluated and selected
bacalhau in the shop. Interestingly, this implies that rules and rituals for quality
assessment are passed on between generations.
Another interesting aspect of the quotes listed previously is that several of the
mentioned quality dimensions are experience characteristics, which means that they
can only be assessed after cooking, such as flavour and the ability to “flake”.
 Our interviews also revealed some rather curious quality criteria, i.e.: “A good Consumer
bacalhau has a v-shaped tailfin and a lightly yellow colour”. There are no “objective” evaluation of
reasons to believe that a bacalhau with a v-shaped tailfin should be any better or worse
than a bacalhau with a “normal” tailfin. Another curious quality criterion was this: bacalhau
“The female bacalhau is the best. The females have a type of skin close to the head that
“behaves” like rubber when it is cut”. When we asked her to explain this, she referred
to the stretch marks of a woman having given birth. Thus, a bacalhau with elastic skin 221
had to be a female – and they were perceived to be the best. This is interesting, because
it reveals a quality criterion that has nothing to do with physical product quality, as
there are no objective quality differences between male and female cod – and
importantly – it is impossible to distinguish a male and female cod just by looking at
their skin. In fact, the only way to distinguish a male from a female cod is to inspect
their intestines at the moment of gutting. However curious it may be, believing that one
is eating a female cod seems to lead to (some) satisfied customers.
During the focus group sessions some frustration among the participants surfaced
when the discussion focused on knowledge of bacalhau. Although the participants had
been buying and consuming bacalhau for a long time, they appeared not to know much
about it, or in the words of one of them:
“We are a country eating so much bacalhau, and we do not know much about it. It
makes me sad to answer this question, because I understand that I do not know much
either. I know I like it, I know it is a good and versatile product, but I know nothing
more.

Quality assessment in the supermarket

We found large variations in how – and to what extent – consumers evaluate
bacalhaus in the supermarket. Our in-store observations showed that some consumers
seemingly picked a random piece from the stack of bacalhaus and thus engaged
themselves very little in product assessment. Other shoppers spent much time and
effort by the stack considering a large number of different bacalhaus before choosing
one (or several). One of the consumers we interviewed told us: “It takes time to select
bacalhau. I look, look again, and spend maybe ten minutes to find a good one”. But how
are bacalhaus assessed? And, which senses do consumers rely on to make their
assessments? Our observations and interviews revealed that in addition to inspecting
the bacalhau visually, consumers also touched and smelled the products as part of their
quality assessment.
It should be noted that assessing bacalhaus by touch varied. As noted previously,
some picked the first one they found, whereas others actually avoided touching the
bacalhaus and instead engaged a shop assistant to pick up and pack the bacalhaus, or
as explained: “I use the shop assistant because I do not like my hands to smell. I do not
like to touch a lot of bacalhaus”. For most customers, however, it was common to touch
and pick up the bacalhaus, and this practice served several purposes. Some picked up
the bacalhaus in order to inspect the skin side (which in the stack is facing down) and
to smell the product. Touching also served the purpose of “feeling” the quality (cf. Peck
and Childers, 2006), e.g.: “I touch every place on the bacalhau, especially the tail part”.
Through the interviews and focus groups we learnt that touching was done partly to
try and feel how dry the bacalhau was. Another rather surprising way of trying to
assess the dryness of the bacalhau was that some customers actually broke the tail of
EJM the bacalhau, but not to the extent that it fell off. They would often do this with several
43,1/2 bacalhaus before making their choice, thus putting back more or less damaged
products.
The focus groups revealed that some consumers were disgusted by knowing that
others had touched the bacalhaus. An interesting consequence of such “consumer
contamination” (Argo et al., 2006) is that many customers seem to avoid the bacalhaus
222 on top of the stacks because they are believed to have been touched, evaluated, and
discarded by previous customers, e.g.: “I mostly pick fish down in the stack because the
top ones have been touched a lot”. This has the implication that stacks of bacalhau
become rather messy on busy days. Ironically, shop assistants have to touch numerous
bacalhaus as they try to keep the stacks in order.

Panel evaluation
More than half of the participants in this part of the study reported eating bacalhau
once or twice a week and ten per cent reported eating bacalhau more than twice a week.
The consumption pattern did not differ significantly between the different age groups.
The participants were asked to report their perceived competence in assessing the
quality of bacalhau. The results are reported in Figure 1.
Figure 1 reveals several interesting observations. First, very few participants report
being “very good” at evaluating bacalhau, and the majority in all age groups report
their competence as being “neither good nor bad”. Given that most of these people eat
bacalhau weekly this finding is surprising. Figure 1 also shows that older people, to a
larger extent than younger people, assess their competence to be “good”, indicating
that age is to some extent related positively to perceived competence. It should be noted
that we compared self-reported competence with consumption rate, but found no
significant differences between consumption and competence.

Ranking of bacalhau and evaluation of flavour (overall liking)

Figure 2 shows how the nine different products were ranked by the participants before
cooking. We only report how often the different products were ranked first (best liked)
and last (least liked).

Figure 1.
Self-reported competence
in assessing the quality of
bacalhau
 Consumer
evaluation of
bacalhau

223

Figure 2.
Ranking of the nine
different bacalhaus before
cooking (n ¼ 120)

Figure 2 is interesting in several ways. First, the figure shows a certain consistency in
ranking, in that product F4 and P4 are frequently ranked the best – and at the same
time very few ranked these products last. Similarly, the product OLD were ranked last
by 32 per cent of participants and at the same time only four per cent ranked this
product first. Second, participants also disagreed in their ranking for some products
such as P2, F8, and P1. For example, 24 per cent of participants ranked P1 as the least
liked product but at the same time 13 per cent of participants ranked it their best
product.
The participants also tasted and assessed the same products after they had been
desalted and cooked (same procedure for all samples). The mean scores for overall
liking are presented in Table I.
Inspection of Table I shows that the mean score for the nine products differ from
5.69 to 6.37. It can also be seen that products F3 and P3 received higher mean scores
than did F4 and OLD, and that the differences are statistically significant (pairwise
t-test, p , 0:05).
An important question raised in the introduction is whether consumers are able to
select unlabelled and unbranded products so that they are provided with the best
possible eating (sensory) experience. By inspecting Table I and Figure 2 it is possible to
gain some insight into this question. If we first look at the lowest ranked product, OLD,
we can see that it also received the lowest mean score in the taste evaluation, indicating
that participants – through their assessment of product appearance – would be able to
avoid OLD. However, it is more worrying that the highest ranked product F4 received
the second lowest mean score in the taste evaluation, indicating that participants when
shopping would be likely to pick F4, a product that turned out to be one of the least
liked products. Other indications of inconsistencies between ranking and taste are also
revealed. For example, the best tasting product, F3, is – based on its appearance –

Product F3 P3 P1 F1 F8 P4 P2 F4 OLD

Mean scores 6.37a 6.32a 6.3ab 6.27ab 6.26ab 6.07ab 6.03abc 5.95bc 5.69c Table I.
Mean scores for “overall
Note: Values marked with different letters were significantly different (p , 0:05); n ¼ 118; liking” for the different
Scale: 1 ¼ “dislike extremely” to 9 ¼ “I love it” bacalhaus after cooking
EJM ranked first by only 7 per cent and ranked last by 8 per cent. And the second best liked
43,1/2 product was ranked first by only 3 per cent. These puzzling findings are elaborated
further in the next section.

Discussion
Our results show several interesting findings regarding consumer assessments of an
224 unlabelled and unbranded food product. For example, we found that consumers
included in our study do not rate their own competence in assessing bacalhau quality
very high and certainly lower than what could be expected in light of their substantial
experience with shopping, cooking, and eating bacalhau. Further, some of the quality
criteria applied are based on characteristics of the product that are not related to
“objective” product quality. In addition, as part of their in-store assessment of
bacalhau, some shoppers touch products extensively trying to “feel” the quality, and
some even break the tail to assess the dryness of the product. Often, several products
are damaged and put back before the “right” one is found. The focus groups revealed
that some participants were disgusted by knowing that others had or were touching
the bacalhaus. Finally, an intriguing finding from the consumer panel was that the
highest ranked product among nine different bacalhaus received the second lowest
mean score when the same products were evaluated based on tasting the cooked
product. How can these findings be explained, what are their limitations, and what
implications can be drawn from our study?
How is it possible that very experienced participants rate their competence in
evaluating bacalhau quality so modestly? This finding is surprising, because past
research shows that consumers generally are overconfident when rating their own
product knowledge, i.e. they think they know more than they actually do (Alba and
Hutchinson, 2000). One possible explanation is that participants are truly modest and
thus devaluate their own competence. However, our findings, indicating that
consumers express frustration and uncertainty regarding quality assessment, lead us
to believe that their assessment of their own competence may reflect their true
opinions. Intuitively, this explanation also makes sense, because judging the quality of
an unbranded and unlabelled product such as bacalhau is likely to be very difficult
(Anderson and Anderson, 1991; Grunert et al., 2004). And, importantly, it is likely to be
difficult to learn from past experience, because the appearance and “feel” of the
bacalhau in the supermarket may only to a limited degree be directly related to
desirable eating properties, such as flavour or the ability to “flake”. Our panel study,
which indicated large discrepancies between how the same products were assessed
before and after cooking, supports this claim. Thus, in line with our theoretical
expectations, our findings indicate that learning from experience might not occur here
(Brehmer, 1980). This also corresponds with findings from studies of other unlabelled
and unbranded products, such as fresh meat (e.g. Grunert et al., 2004; Steenkamp and
Van Trijp, 1996). Consumers might have realised this and understood that assessing
bacalhau in the store is very difficult – as reflected in their modest assessment of their
own competence.
An interesting finding was that some consumers would spend up to 10 minutes
assessing bacalhaus in the supermarket. However, due to the high uncertainty
regarding quality, as discussed previously, spending more time does not necessarily
lead to improved accuracy in terms of selecting the better products. With the very
strong position of bacalhau in Portuguese cuisine spanning several decades and Consumer
centuries we find it more likely that time-consuming shopping rituals have developed evaluation of
as part of the food culture surrounding bacalhau (Askegaard and Madsen, 1995;
Douglas, 1982; Rook, 1985). Being part of a food culture, such rituals may be perceived bacalhau
as meaningful and enjoyable, thus enhancing the shopping experience (Holbrook and
Hirschman, 1982). The in-store assessment of bacalhau may – together with the
time-consuming soaking procedure, as well as cooking based on traditional recipes – 225
constitute central parts of the consumption experience, which consumers increasingly
find enjoyable in modern society (Pine and Gilmore, 1998). For traditional products,
such as pasta in Italy, this type of consumption experience have been closely linked to
consumer identity and national culture (Dalli and Romani, 2007) (see Plate 1).
Our findings revealed some rather peculiar quality criteria, such as the bacalhau
having a v-shaped tailfin or being female. Interestingly, a rather inventive explanation
was provided for the preference for bacalhaus from female cod. Clearly, these criteria
are not related to objective product quality and thus are not useful as such. So why are
they applied? We believe these observations can be explained partly by rituals and
myths surrounding bacalhau consumption that have developed in Portuguese society
over several centuries. A high level of uncertainty regarding quality assessment and a
low perceived level of knowledge of bacalhau provide fertile ground for constructing
inventive explanations and myths.
Our findings show that some consumers touch products extensively, indicating that
touch is important in their product evaluation. On the other hand, our focus groups
revealed that some consumers are disgusted by other consumers touching products.
Also, some consumers actually reduce the value of products by breaking the tail on
(several) bacalhaus before finding the one they want. For retailers, a strategy of
allowing consumers to touch products as part of their quality assessment may
resemble a double edged sword; should they allow shoppers to touch products,
implying good sales to touch-prone consumers with the consequence that others are
disgusted, or should they prevent touching products and possibly reduce sales to
touch-prone shoppers? If retailers want to reduce potentially negative effects of
consumer contamination, product packaging is one solution. This would also be
beneficial to those who are reluctant to touch products in order to avoid salt and smell
on their hands. However, it seems sensible to use packaging with a “window”, so that
shoppers can assess the product by its appearance, including its colour. If such a
packaging strategy is applied, it also presents an opportunity for producers and
retailers to reduce consumer uncertainty regarding quality by branding the product
and labelling it with information on quality (e.g. grading of dryness, colour, and
thickness).
The research presented and discussed previously is based on data from one specific
product in one specific country. Does this mean that our findings and discussions are
only valid in this particular context? To some extent the answer is yes. For instance,
emphasis on the dryness of bacalhaus and the way some consumers assess bacalhau
by breaking the product to discern its dryness is likely to be rather product specific.
Such findings have thus little value for other products. A limited ability to generalise
findings regarding consumer quality perceptions is, however, common. It has also been
argued that perceived quality is specific to individual goods or services (Babakus and
Boller, 1992). Research also shows that food quality perceptions may differ across
EJM different cultures (e.g. Askegaard and Madsen, 1995; Grunert, 1997). Universal notions
43,1/2 of perceived quality may thus be of lesser value (Levitt, 1981). For this reason, some
researchers limit their study to a single product in order to obtain meaningful results
(see, e.g. the study of consumer quality perception of red wine (Jover et al., 2004).
On the other hand, based on our study, some general reflections with implication for
future research can be made. An intriguing observation is the rather peculiar criteria
226 some consumers use to assess quality, and especially those criteria that are not
objectively related to product quality. It seems likely that such criteria have developed
over time to become part of cultural rules and rituals surrounding shopping,
preparation, and consumption of bacalhau in Portuguese society. These criteria may,
even though they are inaccurate, play meaningful roles in terms of communicating
cultural identity (Douglas, 1982). An interesting task for future research on perceived
quality and quality assessment is to pursue this line of thought by further examining
how cultural rules and rituals may influence quality perception and assessment. This
may lead to an improved understanding of consumer behaviour related to food
products that are culturally important.

Note
1. That a bacalhau “flakes” refers to what can be observed by cooking a thick piece of cod,
putting it on a plate and gently pressing it with a fork. The muscle segments then pile up in a
horizontal stack. In Portuguese this is referred to as “soltar lascas” or “lascar-se” and is for
some a very important product attribute that can only be experienced after cooking.

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EJM About the authors
Geir Sogn-Grundvåg is a Senior Researcher with the Department of Strategy, Economics and
43,1/2 Marketing at the Norwegian Institute of Fisheries and Aquaculture Research, Norway. His
research interests include market orientation, marketing knowledge development and use, and
exploitation of competitive advantages in emergent and turbulent industries.
Jens Østli is a Senior Researcher at the Department of Strategy, Economics and Marketing
with the Norwegian Institute of Fisheries and Aquaculture Research, Norway. His research
228 interests relate to product development, both in terms of how methodologies relate to a better
understanding of the product/consumer interface and how changes in product processing and
presentation influence both perceived and experienced sensory qualities of seafood. Jens Østli is
the corresponding author and can be contated at: jens.ostli@fiskeriforskning.no

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