Research on Consumer Preferences in Wine and Cheese Selection: Market Basket Analysis

In this research, the association rules mining for the wine and cheese attributes was conducted for the retail chain “Semya” operating in the Perm Region. This issue is rather important to consider as the information will help the retailer to analyze customer preferences. Research in the field of wine and cheese combinations was carried out only in terms of product’s taste. This study examines consumer behavior in the in-store shopping cart. To search the combinations, the market basket analysis (MBA) was chosen, particularly the application of the associative rules method (Apriori-algorithm). Based on the obtained results the conclusions were the following. Hard cheese is appropriate for the wines, consumers buy processed cheese together with dry red wine, customers of the retail chain buy white cheese and pickled cheese both with red (dry and semi-sweet) and white one. This information will help the marketers to apply joint pricing, cross-selling and improve the efficiency of merchandising.