Abstract:
This research is aimed to 1) study behavior in using services of open markets; 2) study marketing and environmental factors affecting the use of open markets services; 3) study relationship between personal factors and behavior in using open markets services; 4) study relationship between marketing and environmental factors with people behavior in using open markets services. The 400 study subjects were people in Amphur Muang, Surat Thani Province who used open markets services using accidentally-random sampling. The tool employed was in the form of a questionnaire while the statistics used were those such as frequency, percentage, average values, and standard deviation with Chi-square test.
It was found that most of the study subjects were female, between 36 - 45 years of age, married, holding bachelors degree, and working for state enterprises, receiving average monthly salary between 10,001 - 15,000 baht, living with 3 - 4 member family and domiciled in Amphur Muang, Surat Thani Province. As for behavior in using open markets services, it was found that most of the subjects preferred going to Tambon Klong Noi open market because of its variety of choices with frequency of visit of once a week during 03.01 pm. - 07.30 pm, spending less than 30 minutes per visit to buy food, confectionary and snack, going there by motorcycle with friends, and knowing this market by oneself. Marketing environmental factors affecting the use of services in overall were in the order from high to low level as follows: price, distribution channel/location, products, economic situation, social and cultural features and marketing promotion respectively. The relationship between personal factors and the use of services showed that sex, age, educational level, marital status, occupation, number of family member, and average monthly income were related significantly at 0.05 levels. Every aspect of marketing and environmental factors was also found to be related to the use of services significantly at 0.05 levels.