QUALITY EXPECTATIONS IN PERSONAL CARE: A QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

Abstract

Purpose- Personal care items, which are regularly used in everyday life, occupy a significant portion of everyone's existence. In personal care items that are applied to the skin, sense of quality is critical. As a result, the purpose of this study is to investigate the dimensions of quality in personal care and to determine which aspects people view to be of high or low quality while using personal care products. Methodology- With a total of 177 participants in the face-to-face survey, the brands that respondents regard as high or low quality in the personal care products they use, as well as the reasons behind this, were investigated. The MAXODA 2022 software was used to evaluate the survey findings. Findings- The survey resulted in the discovery of 12 dimensions. Health, appropriateness, dependability, performance, perceived quality, aesthetics, variety, size, durability, extra features, service, and environmentalalism are all repeated throughout most of these aspects. in terms of suitability; product efficiency, persistent odor, ease of use, cleaning and repair, reliability; performance consistency, trouble-free and permanence, in terms of performance; repair, stain removal, shaping, covering, dryness removal, color pigmentation, permanence, cleaning and odor, perceived quality dimensions; brand image, advertisement, and price, in terms of perceived quality dimensions; brand image, advertisement, and price, in terms of perceived quality dimensions; brand image, advertisement, and price, in terms of perceived quality dimensions; brand image When word frequencies were studied, it was shown that people frequently used terms like permanence and color, , odor, dandruff, harm, natural and price. The brands that individuals refer to most are avon, elidor and maybelline. Elidor and Maybelline brands were evaluated positively, while Avon brand was evaluated negatively. Conclusion- As a result of the analyzes, when the evaluations of the users' personal care products were examined, it was seen that the most important factors were dimensions such as health, suitability, reliability and performance. When we examined the word frequencies to observe the quality perceptions that individuals developed towards personal care products, it was seen that the words such as permanence, color, odor, dandruff, harm, natural and price were mostly mentioned. When the brands are examined, it is observed that while Elidor and Maybelline are evaluated as high quality, Avon brand is generally evaluated as poor quality. Keywords: Personal care, quality, quality dimensions, quality perception, product quality. JEL Codes: M00, M11, M31