International Journal of Management (IJM)

Volume 11, Issue 10, October 2020, pp. 645-658, Article ID: IJM_11_10_061
Available online at http://www.iaeme.com/IJM/issues.asp?JType=IJM&VType=11&IType=10
ISSN Print: 0976-6502 and ISSN Online: 0976-6510
DOI: 10.34218/IJM.11.10.2020.061

© IAEME Publication Scopus Indexed

CUSTOMER SATISFACTION TOWARDS FAST

FOOD THROUGH ONLINE FOOD DELIVERY
(OFD) SERVICES: AN EXPLORATORY STUDY
Deepayan Ghosh
Symbiosis Institute of Business Management (SIBM),
Symbiosis International University (SIU),
Electronics City, Hosur Road,
Bengaluru, Karnataka, India

ABSTRACT
The fast-food market in India is growing rapidly in India with changing habits and
agile lifestyles. At the same time, Technology is diffusing rapidly into the deepest
pockets of India, with cheaper data and betterment of digital infrastructure. In this
context, many fast-food brick and mortar stores are increasing their digital presence
in order to cope with the Technological disruption across all segments. These online
retailers have been empowered by Aggregators who aim to better synchronize demand
and supply of products, leveraging technological innovations. A major challenge
encountered by these Online retailers in a highly fragmented and competitive industry
is to retain customers, and subsequent loss of revenue and market share. Customer
Satisfaction has been dubbed as an antecedent to Customer Loyalty in several studies
and is a potential solution to retaining customers in the face of numerous alternatives
and low switching costs. The study at hand aims to bring out the factors influencing
Customer Satisfaction in the tech enabled Indian Fast-Food industry, through an
exploratory analysis via a structured questionnaire. The 23 attributes used to gauge
the relationship have been borrowed from past studies in the related domain. The
results have isolated five factors can assist Service marketeers to better formulate
online retailing strategies, particularly catering to Fast food customers. These factors
have been named as “Quality”, “Customer service”, “Price”, “Delivery” and
“Time” with “Quality” being the most significant.
Key words: Customer Satisfaction, Exploratory Factor Analysis, Fast-food, Online
Food Delivery
Cite this Article: Deepayan Ghosh, Customer Satisfaction Towards Fast Food
Through Online Food Delivery (OFD) Services: An Exploratory Study, International
Journal of Management, 11(10), 2020, pp. 645-658.
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 Customer Satisfaction Towards Fast Food Through Online Food Delivery (OFD) Services: An
Exploratory Study

1. INTRODUCTION
In this fast-moving and ever-changing world, time is a limited resource. Often, a small
craving for a snack or an odd meal is satisfied in the form of fast food, which caters to our
taste well as saves our time. The whole essence of timesaving has been accelerated by the
presence of Online Food Delivery services, which have proliferated in large numbers over the
past decade.
As more and more Businesses take up the Technology space, with a digital presence being
almost for gaining a competitive advantage, Online Delivery platforms like Swiggy, Zomato
have found an increasing number of Partner restaurants including fast-food chains and stand-
alone fast-food shops. Therefore, the concept of saving time through a quick fast food has
been made more convenient through an App-based delivery at the touch of a button.
The future revenue and profits of businesses joining this tech enabled pipeline is
influenced by repurchasing intentions and behaviors of customers, which in turn is directly
influenced by Customers satisfaction towards these services (Qin and Prybutok, 2009).
Previous research has shown the positive implication of Customer satisfaction and Brand
Loyalty towards positive word of mouth, better financial performance, and even the
likelihood of CEOs receiving bonuses (Andersonet al., 2004; Gilbert et al., 2004; Fornell et
al., 2006; Oliver,2010). Measuring Customer satisfaction is thus an imperative when trying to
understand market performance of any business and becomes difficult at the same time as
brands relocate internationally.
The evolution of Online Food delivery systems has been correlated to growing number of
smart phone users, digital marketing, and e-commerce in India. As reported by IBEF, the size
of the E-commerce market in India is expected to reach US$ 200 Bn by 2027, growing at a
CAGR of 20.09%. This trend has been facilitated by the growing number of smart phone
users which is expected to reach 829 Mn by 2021 as per IBEF. This implies that more than
60% of the Indian population is set to have access to cheap data and are likely to available
Online services and engage in Online shopping. The global scenario in this context has been a
step ahead as digital integration has taken place much earlier as compared to the Indian
landscape.
(Srivastava,2014) states that the Indian Fast-Food market is witnessing rapid growth due
to several factors like increasing middle-class income, rising population of the youth, rising
number of working women, tight schedules, etc. According to (Massimilani and Sundaram,
2012) massive investments have also contributed to the rapid growth of the Fast-Food market.
Fast food offers Cost Advantage and Quick Service helping it gain popularity amongst the
masses.
As summarized by (Chitnis, 2019) the fast-food industry in India is growing at 40% year
on year and commands huge sales. The number of fast-food outlets of major brands like Mc
Donald’s, and Pizza hut are expected to reach 500 and 700 respectively, by the year 2020. In
terms of per capita spending, Fast food stands at the 10th position in India.
It has been observed that even though the Fast-food industry in India shows promise,
Customer loyalty and retention are concerning issues, mainly due to the variety in products
and brands. It is in this context the research at hand finds business implications, as Customer
satisfaction towards fast food contributes to many factors for positive business outlook, as
discussed previously.
The study aims at exploring the determinants of Customer Satisfaction towards Online
Food delivery services pertaining to fast food through Exploratory Statistical techniques.
While previous research has studied Fast Food and Online Delivery services separately, this is

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 Deepayan Ghosh

the first attempt to study the digitally integrated markets together, and hence contribute to the
gap in literature.
The paper is organized in four sections. The ensuing section looks at the literature review,
gaps and theoretical background. The third section focusses on the development of hypothesis
and statistical analysis, while the final section presents the findings with managerial
implications. The paper concludes with a discussion on its limitation and scope for future
research in this domain.

2. REVIEW OF LITERATURE
The implication of fast-food consumption on businesses and the economy has been studied
extensively in previous research. (Tiwari and Verma, 2008), states that in developed countries
a significant share of revenues comes from fast food in developed countries, and the same
kind of growth can be observed in some developing world as the food habits of people are
changing quite fast. It is mostly preferred due to its ease in preparation, cost-effectiveness,
and substantial product promotion.
Some of the examples of Fast Food include pizzas, hamburgers, chicken, etc. (Kara et al.,
1995) Studied the importance of Demographics on Fast Food consumption in Canada and
concluded that price and variety are sought after by the newer generation, while the senior and
the elderly look for values like quality, taste and service reliability. The middle age group
looks for presentable staff and quick service. The implications of fast-food consumption and
behavior of consumers towards the same has been studied extensively. As mentioned before
in our Introductory section, food habits are changing with the rapidly evolving agile world
and agile workplaces.
(Wang et al., 2020) Concluded socio-demographic characteristics had a significant effect
on food e-commerce consumption. In a sample of 954 participants from 3 Chinese cities they
studied Taste Appeal, Value for Money, Safety Concerns, Quality Concerns, Purchase
Convenience, Others' Reviews, City, Gender, Household Size, Age, Income, Occupation, and
Marital Status.
(Islam and Ullah, 2010) explored the preference of fast food consumers in Dhaka city and
their study revealed that consumers gave greater importance to brand reputation followed by
other factors like accessibility and nearness to receive, the similarity of taste with previous
experience, quality and cost of food, taste, and discount, hygiene and cleanliness,
salesmanship and decoration, fat and cholesterol level and self-service. An understanding of
the consumption behavior of youth could be insightful for the companies to target this
segment to market their products/services in a better way. Segmentation of these consumers
could enable the marketers to formulate clearer strategies to target different segments in an
effective manner. If a product such as Fast Food contributes significantly to the economy and
consumer behavior, it will be interesting from the point of view of research, to understand its
amalgamation with the technological landscape.
The importance of technology in the modern world is evident with its disruption across all
industries, with modern business trying to leverage technology as a source of competitive
advantage. In this context, (Jiang et al., 2013), concluded that a consumer's perception
towards online shopping will improve if the service can provide access convenience, which is
the ability to shop online at anytime and anywhere. They concluded that consumers prefer to
opt for Online Services to reduce the burden of traveling. (Liang and Lim, 2011) Emphasized
the need of using the Internet to gain a Competitive Advantage pertaining to Food Producers.
They studied in detail, the Online Buying behavior pertaining to specialty Food shoppers.
Specialty foods are bought at a premium price because of the differentiating value they offer.
The primary goal of a Fast-Food shopper on the other hand is a substantial cost advantage.

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 Customer Satisfaction Towards Fast Food Through Online Food Delivery (OFD) Services: An
Exploratory Study

The sample studied was limited to undergraduate students. (Chang et al., 2012; Ingham et al.,
2015; Wagner et al., 2016) state that it is important for food retailers to find the reasons
motivating consumers to buy from the online medium.
(Shah et al., 2020) Studied consumer dining habits through mobile applications only,
limited to Indonesia. They concluded that Customers perceive value through these services on
Parameters like Review Valence, Navigation Systems, Quality of Food, and these factors in
turn affect their Purchase Intentions. Thus, we can conclude from this Research that Mobile
Applications play a major role in dining choices. It remains to be seen how these factors play
out in the Indian Fast-Food market, where mobile purchases are increasing, and data is being
increasingly democratized.
(Wen et al., 2020) Concluded that Chinese citizens now prefer to order food online post-
COVID 19 eras. (Zhang, 2020) Suggest US tourists prefer to make take away or order
delivery to minimize interpersonal interactions amidst the Global Pandemic. It can be taken
from here that. In developed economies are increasingly reliant on Online Delivery Services
to tackle the Global Pandemic and thus, Fast food eating habits can be brought under this
consideration.
Customer Satisfaction has been considered as a critical factor when it comes to evaluation
of a Service Quality. Several studies have considered Customer Satisfaction as an antecedent
to Customer Loyalty across businesses and industries (Qin, et al. 2010, Kedah et al., 2015,
Haghighi et al., 2012, Sunaryo et al., 2019) while some have considered it as an antecedent to
behavioral intentions (Canny, 2014). In either case, Customer Satisfaction has been observed
as a mediator variable and has significant effect on Loyalty and Behavioral intentions.
Loyal Customers are likely to make repeat purchases, increase revenues and profits of a
business, increasing positive word of mouth at the same time. It thus becomes necessary to
understand the role of Customer Satisfaction as it governs many business outcomes.
An empirical analysis was carried out in the city of Tehran by (Haghighi et al.,2012) in 10
randomly selected branches of a popular Fast-food chain, to determine Customer Loyalty
towards fast food. Confirmatory Factor Analysis technique vis Structural Equation Modelling
was undertaken on the responses of 268 customers, whereby the results obtained indicated
that Restaurant environment, Food and Service Quality and Price have a significant effect on
Customer Satisfaction. The same research concludes that Customer Satisfaction has a positive
effect on Customer Loyalty with evidence from significant path coefficients obtained through
SEM. The paper mentions Food Quality has a strong positive effect on Customer Satisfaction.
While Food Quality and Service Quality are generally considered as most significant
factors in determining Customer Satisfaction and Loyalty, a contradictory result was observed
in the Confirmatory Analysis undertaken by (Sunaryo et al., 2019) in the Malaysian Fast-
Food industry. The study is important in the sense that it describes that fast service and the
limited physical space provided by Brick and Mortar stores, render Factors such as
“Environment” irrelevant while gauging Customer Satisfaction. This idea brought out by the
said paper, brings us at a juncture where we can begin our discussion on the importance of
Online medium in the context of Fast Food industry, with effects of physical environment
provided by B&M stores being nullified.
With the importance of Customer Satisfaction being brought out in a business context,
instruments to measure the same become an important point for discussion. The Customer
Satisfaction Survey (CSS) Scale developed by (Nicholls et al, 1998) has been used for
measuring Satisfaction in Fast food industries across several geographies. (Gilbert et al.,
2004) validated the scale across several geographies and cultures and the scale was later
implemented in the Australian Fast-Food industry by (Phau and Ferguson, 2013). The

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 Deepayan Ghosh

instrument measures Customer Satisfaction across 17 items and has been able to isolate three
key constructs influencing Customer Satisfaction namely, Personal Satisfaction, Satisfaction
with Assurance and Satisfaction with Service Setting. Again, the studies at hand have gauged
Satisfaction in Brick and Mortar Fast Food stores where physical environment provides
multiple points of Service encounter.
When it comes to gauging Satisfaction levels while ordering Food through the Online
medium, (Kedah et al., 2015) tested a conceptual model empirically, through Confirmatory
analysis techniques. The key constructs incorporated in the model include Delivery, Payment,
Quality, Customer Service and Security among others, many of which were not present in
previous models because they were limited to B&M Fast Food customers. The study
discusses the importance of attractive web designs, personal information and payment
security as critical factors attributable to determining Satisfaction in food orders in the online
space.
The importance of E-service quality was stressed upon by studies such as (Suhartanto et
al., 2018), where the conceptual model validated the same constructed as a significant
contributor towards Customer Satisfaction while ordering through Online Food Delivery
(OFD) Services. The importance of Time as a significant factor in the context of Online
shopping was substantiated by (Vasic et al., 2018) through Confirmatory Factor Analysis of a
conceptual model in the Serbian Market.
After touching upon the studies related to specifically Fast Food , importance of Customer
Satisfaction, measurement scales of Customer Satisfaction, and studies across several
geographies and cultures on fast food related satisfaction parameters in both online and offline
context it becomes imperative to discuss developments in the Indian Context.
In this context, (Srivastava, 2004) studied the preference of Indian customer towards both
Indian and Global chains and concluded that Indian customers are more loyal towards Global
chains and generate more positive word of mouth. The study shed extensive light on fast food
consumption in emerging economies and the findings have been incorporated in our study to
the best extent possible.

3. IDENTIFICATION OF RESEARCH GAP

Customer Satisfaction studies have been prevalent for a long time in the fast-food industry,
and authors like (Nicholls et al.,1998) have gone to the extent of developing scales for
measuring the same. While extensive research has been carried out in measuring Satisfaction
along several factors, most of these studies are focused on the brick and mortar stores. (Qin, et
al., 2010, Haghighi, et al.2012, Canny, 2014, and Namin, 2017)
In the context of Online Shopping, Customer Satisfaction was studied by (Vasic et al.,
2018) in the city of Serbia. However, these are determinants of the general buying behavior of
customers and is not limited to Fast Food. The importance of Time as an important construct
in determining Customer Satisfaction has been adopted in our study, to focus specifically on
Fast Food industry.
When we observe studies on the Indian fast-food industry, (Srivastava 2014) has been
able to establish key determinants of loyalty towards Fast Food chains. The studies in the
Indian context have been on similar lines and largely on the offline medium.
Studies on Food consumption through Online medium was studied by (Kedah et al., 2015)
however the research is broad and encompasses all categories of food, the satisfaction on
consumption of which are tested through Confirmatory Analysis.
Thus, there has been a paucity in research when it comes to studying factors influencing
Customer Satisfaction towards Fast food particularly through the Online medium and within

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 Customer Satisfaction Towards Fast Food Through Online Food Delivery (OFD) Services: An
Exploratory Study

the geographical limits of Indian tech enabled landscape. All significant constructs from
previous research in the related field, have been incorporated in our study to the best extent
possible and we have attempted to bridge this gap through an exploratory study.

4. OBJECTIVES
To identify the factors influencing Customer Satisfaction in consumption of Fast Food
through the Online Medium, in Indian cities

5. METHODOLOGY
5.1. Questionnaire Design
The questionnaire is divided into 2 parts. The first part captures demographic information
along the lines of Age, Gender, Occupation, Tier of City and Frequency of weekly first food
orders.
The second part captures Likert measurement on a 5-point scale on 23 key attributes for
seven constructs used to measure Customer Satisfaction. These constructs and corresponding
23 items have been adapted from previous studies in this domain. The constructs include
Food Quality(Qin, et al. (2010), Haghighi, et al. (2012)), Service Quality(Kedah et al., 2015;
Kim et al., 2009; Parasuraman et al., 2005), Payment(Kedah et al., 2015), Customer
Service(Kedah et al., 2015), Delivery(Kedah et al., 2015), Price(Qin, et al. (2010), Jin, et al.
(2012), and Namin (2017), Vasic et al., (2018)) and Time (Vasic et al., 2018). The items and
corresponding statements have been mapped in the ensuing section.

Table 1 Sources of Constructs from Literature

Constructs Statements
Food Quality The restaurant serves Fresh food
The food packaging is visually appealing
There is a variety of foods to choose from
E-Service Quality The order is delivered as promised
The web/app interface is difficult to use
The web is available whenever needed
My personal information is safe with the web
Sources
Qin, et al. (2010), Haghighi, et al. (2012), Jin, et
al. (2012), Canny (2014), and Namin (2017)
Sunaryo et.al, 2019 Srinivasan et al., 2002,
Kedah et al., 2015

Price Discounts received through online purchase are Qin, et al. (2010), Jin, et al. (2012), and Namin
satisfactory (2017), Vasic et al., (2018)
Service standards are not met for the money I pay
Quality standards are met for the money I pay
Payment The several payment options increase the ease of Kedah et al., 2015
purchase
Transaction time is short
The Payment system is not secure
Delivery My order is delivered on time Kedah et al., 2015
Live tracking feature helps me track the ETA
The delivery professional is courteous and
presentable.
Delivery charges are not suitable for the service
offered
Time Ordering fast food online is time saving Vasic et al., 2018
There is 24/7 online service available
Ordering fast food online is smart time spending
Customer Service My grievances are handled swiftly Kedah et al., 2015
Return/Refund is provided for faulty/mistaken orders
The grievance addressal system is convenient to use

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 Deepayan Ghosh

5.2. Data Collection Method

Primary data was collected through the Questionnaire and circulated amongst Tier I/II/III/IV
citizens across diverse Age groups and Occupational profiles. A total of 260 respondents
disclosed their views along the 23 items; Questionnaire was mailed, and Snowball sampling
technique was observed while collecting these responses.

6. RESULTS & DISCUSSIONS

6.1. Demographic Profile
A total of 260 respondent’s Demographic characteristics have been captured in the following
table

Table 2 Respondent Demographic Profile; Source: Primary Data

No. of
S.No. Descriptions Percentages
Respondents
<18 4 2%
19-25 127 49%
26-30 38 15%
1 Age
31-35 29 11%
36-40 43 17%
>40 19 7%
Working Professional 76 29%
Student 119 46%
Homemaker 13 5%
2 Occupation Businessman 8 3%
Retired Working
19 7%
Professional
Teacher 25 10%
Male 171 66%
3 Gender Female 88 34%
Prefer not to say 1 0%
Tier I 144 55%
Tier II 53 20%
4 Tier of City Tier III 27 10%
Tier IV 29 11%
Other 7 3%
Operation of Online Yes 237 91%
5
Food Aggregators No 23 9%
Once 84 32%
Twice 86 33%
Weekly Order
6 Thrice 53 20%
Frequency
More than 3 times 17 7%
Do not order at all 20 8%
Exploratory factor analysis was executed on the 260 responses, with Principal Component
Factoring and the Eigen value cutoff rule of less than 1 (Heir et al., 1998). The components
isolated were subjected to Varimax rotation.

Table 3 Significance of Factor Analysis; Source: Primary Data

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 Customer Satisfaction Towards Fast Food Through Online Food Delivery (OFD) Services: An
Exploratory Study

The KMO coefficient of 0.906 suggests that the Factor Analysis is highly significant and
that the sampling is adequate. The factors extracted at less than 0.5 were rejected and the
Factor Analysis isolated 5 components explaining 78.70 % of the total variance, suggesting
the appropriate nature of the Factor Analysis (Heir et al., 1998). The results suggest that
underlying constructs may be responsible for explaining the variance. The 5-factor model was
verified by the Scree plot where Eigen values started to level off after the 5th component.

Figure 1 Scree Plot; Source: Primary Data

Table 4 Rotated Component Matrix

Rotated Component Matrixa
Component
1 2 3 4 5
Q1: Taste .629 .567 .295 .207 .182
Q2: Freshness .638 .417 .183 .246 .154
Q4: Variety .598 .519 .237 .124 .092
Q5: Ease of Use .536 .504 .389 .136 .136
Q6: Availability .562 .545 .116 .143 .205
Q7: Safety .567 .463 .183 .134 .129
Q8: Price- Quality Trade
.082 .153 .854 .060 .060
off
Q9: Price- Service Trade
.168 .229 .899 .079 .108
off
Q10: Discounts .159 .179 .834 .085 .053
Q11: Ease of Use .821 .192 .139 .185 .159
Q12: Transaction Time .825 .096 .062 .195 .210
Q13: Security .835 .243 .046 .172 .153
Q14: Grievance
.265 .819 .253 .196 .144
Redressal
Q15: Refund .231 .832 .106 .158 .152
Q16: Ease of
.273 .820 .259 .191 .121
Responsiveness
Q17: Timely Delivery .347 .182 .231 .282 .603
Q19: Delivery
.177 .147 .069 .127 .924
professional attitudes
Q20: Delivery charges .178 .147 .034 .057 .918
Q21: Time Saving .231 .168 .059 .872 .100
Q22: Round the clock
.176 .205 .108 .800 .045
Service
Q23: Notification .194 .126 .067 .846 .197

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 Deepayan Ghosh

The rotated component matrix groups the 21 significant items under five underlying
constructs as per factor loadings. The following Table groups the 21 items under 5 constructs
as per the Factor Analysis:

Table 5 Variables under different Factors

Factor 1 (Quality) Factor 2 (Customer Factor 3 (Price) Factor 4 (Time) Factor 5 (Delivery)
Service)
Q1: Taste Q14: Grievance Q8: Price- Quality Q21: Time Saving Q17: Timely Delivery
Q2: Freshness Redressal Tradeoff Q22: Round the Q19: Delivery Professional
Q4: Variety Q15: Refund Q9: Price-Service Clock Service Attitudes
Q5: Ease of Use Q16: Ease of Tradeoff Q23: Notification Q20: Delivery Charges
Q6: Availability Responsiveness Q10: Discounts
Q7: Safety
Q11: Payment Options
Q12: Transaction Time
Q13: Security

Factor 1(Quality)
This factor with an Eigen Value of 10.317 explains 49.129% of the total variance in the data
set and groups the items such as Taste, Freshness, Variety, Ease of Use, Availability, Safety,
Payment Options, Transaction Time and Security. Since this factor encompasses both Product
and Service Quality Related attributes, it can be named as “Quality”. This factor is the most
important factor obtained in our study, and is in line with most previous studies which point
out that Food Quality and Service Quality have the highest positive effect on Customer
Satisfaction in the offline medium context (Haghighi et al., 2012; Etemad-Sajadi &
Rizzuto,2013; Alhelalat, 2017, Suhartanto et al, 2018)
Attributes under this Factor needs to be examined by Online Fast-Food providers in order
to increase the Satisfaction levels of their customers, and hence increased loyalty, and more
revenues with repeat purchases. This is the most important factor affecting Satisfaction levels
of Customers as it affects most of them. Quality related attributes enhancement. should
therefore be the priority of Online Fast-Food Sellers and Aggregators.

Factor 2(Customer Service)

This factor with an Eigen value of 2.061 explains 9.813% of the total variance in the data set.
The factor groups attributes such as Grievance Redressal, Refund, and Ease of
Responsiveness. Customer Service as a Construct was also studied by (Kedah et al., 2015) in
determining Satisfaction levels of Customers towards Fast Food Purchase. This factor
entailing similar attributes as (Kedah et al., 2015) can be named as “Satisfaction with
Customer Service”. The factor qualifies as the second most important factor towards
determining Satisfaction level of Customers as it entails a very important aspect of Service
Quality, which is “Responsiveness”. Modern online businesses should thus aim to be as
Responsive as possible while dealing with Tech enabled Customers with a robust grievance
handling system and prompt feedback.

Factor 3(Price)
The third factor with an Eigen value of 1.554 explains 7.402% of the total variance in the
dataset grouping attributes such as Price-Service Tradeoff, Price-Quality Tradeoff and
Discounts. Pricing in Fast Food services has been studied by Qin, et al. (2010), Jin, et al.
(2012), and Namin (2017), Vasic et al., (2018) in gauging Satisfaction levels of Customers
towards Fast Food purchase. Pricing of Fast-food services have been found significant in

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 Customer Satisfaction Towards Fast Food Through Online Food Delivery (OFD) Services: An
Exploratory Study

previous studies in the offline medium context, and in some cases even more significant than
Service Quality (Sunaryo et al., 2019)
This is the third most important factor in our study and explains why Pricing of Services is
difficult as well as necessary in the context of Services marketing. Fast food businesses in the
online space should pay special attention to Pricing and justify the value for money paid by
their customers to increase Satisfaction Levels and develop Brand Loyalty.

Factor 4(Time)
The fourth factor in our study, with an Eigen value of 1.534 explains 7.307% of the total
variance grouping attributes such as Time Saving, Round the Clock Service and Notification
can be named as “Time”.
While (Vasic et al., 2018) studied Time as a construct in determining Satisfaction in
Online shopping, the study in hand has aimed to gauge its effect in relations to Online Fast-
Food Shopping with similar attributes. Fast food sellers in the Online space should pay
attention to Time management of its services due to the combined concerns of Customers in
terms of providing a food which can be prepared relatively fast as well as it being through an
agile medium such as the Online medium.

Factor 5(Delivery)
The last isolated factor in our study with an Eigen value of 1.062 explains 5.056% of the total
variance, grouping attributes such as “Timely Delivery”,” Delivery Professional Attitudes”
and “Delivery charges”. This factor stresses on the Delivery aspect of Fast-food online orders
and can be named as “Delivery”.
Delivery as a determinant of Customer Satisfaction was studied by (Kedah et.al, 2015)
and is important because of its determining power of the veracity of information provided on
the internet.
Business should focus on proper Delivery attributes such as the ones studied here, to
ensure that they build credibility and increase Customer Satisfaction through the Services
offered.

Reliability Test
Cronbach’s alphas were calculated for each latent construct for determining their reliability
and all the resulting alpha values were sufficiently high (0.868 to 0.945) as depicted in the
next table (Nunnally, 1978; Peterson, 1994). The reliable coefficients indicate good internal
consistency among the items measured by each construct in the Factor Analysis.

Table 6 Reliability of Factors

Serial Cronbach
Number Factor Name Alpha
1 Quality 0.945
2 Customer Service 0.886
3 Pricing 0.939
4 Time 0.868
5 Delivery 0.87

7. IMPLICATIONS OF THE STUDY

The results suggest that five factors are significant while studying Customer Satisfaction
through the online medium in the Indian landscape. Food and Service Quality related factors
named here as “Quality” relates to be the most important factor contributing towards customer

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 Deepayan Ghosh

satisfaction, in line with previous research. The factor encompasses attributes across Food and
Service Quality.
The context of Price is a determinant factor in our study and is in line with (Sunaryo et al.,
2019) who outweighed Price as a Performance Indicator to Satisfaction, even greater the
Quality related factors. The factors isolated in this study is important to Service Marketeers
who can take insights from this research and consider the most important factors to build
loyal customers in the fast-food industry.
The research also builds avenues for subsequent research questions in this domain and
how Service marketeers can improve performance in the studied domain.

8. LIMITATIONS & FUTURE RESEARCH

The study at hand is at constraint when it comes to customers who order fast food but are not
technology enabled. Further research in this domain could shed light as to how Service
marketeers can consider the share of the population who do not have online access but at the
same time are fast food consumers.
Consumer’s biases should be accounted for in the responses. The study at hand is also
limited to the Indian geography, while it would be interesting to gauge satisfaction related
factors across the globe. Future studies in this domain could incorporate the effect of the
Global pandemic to build on factors affecting Customer Satisfaction.
Sample size is limited to 260, a broader sample size may yield better results. It must be
considered here that the sample considered for this study is through a Snowball sampling
technique and that random sampling could yield varying results related to this domain.

9. CONCLUSION
Consumption of fast food through the online medium is significantly different from the Brick
and Mortar experience in the sense that Factors like Physical Environment are rendered
insignificant. The primary research at hand collected responses from 260 respondents across
various geographies in India, diverse age groups and occupational profiles.
The responses were subjected to Principal Component Factor analysis in SPSS for
identifying the underlying constructs explaining variances across the 23 items borrowed from
literature, to find significant effects on Customer Satisfaction. The analysis isolated 5 factors
affecting Customer Satisfaction towards Fast Food consumption in India via the Online
Medium. The most important factor out of the ones isolated is “Quality”, which is in line with
most previous studies. The factor groups items across Food and Service Quality and explains
the highest variance in the respondent dataset.
“Customer Service” is the next most important factor and signifies the importance of
Responsiveness in the context of Services Marketing. There are several technical issues
Customers face while ordering online and addressing them swiftly stands to be a top priority
for online Fast-Food retailers. The next most important factor is “Price” and explains why it is
difficult and at the same time important to correctly Price a Service because of its
heterogeneity and intangible nature. The other factors found significant in our study are
“Time” and “Delivery” which explain the importance of time saving and assurance with the
quality promised online. The study at hand builds avenues for Fast Food businesses operating
in the digital space, to correctly position their service and emphasize on the most important
factors to satisfy their Customers, subsequently increase their Loyalty in a highly fragmented
industry and command more market share through higher revenues.

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 Customer Satisfaction Towards Fast Food Through Online Food Delivery (OFD) Services: An
Exploratory Study

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