New product, familiar taste: Effects of slogans on cognitive and affective responses to an unknown food product among food neophobics and neophilics

• We investigated how food neophobia moderates hedonic responses to a dairy product.
• We compared effects of slogans stressing newness, familiarity and their combination.
• Stressing newness positively influenced hedonic responses in neophilics.
• Stressing familiarity did not affect hedonic responses in neophobics.
• Slogans stressing both newness and familiarity were found ineffective.

Food neophobia is considered a potential barrier for the introduction of new food products. This study investigated how advertising slogans could influence cognitive and affective responses to a new product in food neophobics and food neophilics. An unknown dairy product was used to examine the effectiveness of three different slogans that stressed (1) product newness, (2) product familiarity, and (3) both of these attributes simultaneously. The study used a 2 × 3 between-subjects experimental design (N = 222). Food neophobics showed overall lower hedonic responses to the product than food neophilics. Slogan manipulation affected neophobics and neophilics differently. For neophobics, the slogan stressing familiarity of the product increased their perception of the product as “known”, but did not increase product attractiveness. For neophilics, the slogan conveying newness increased taste expectations and purchase intentions. The mixed slogan showed only partial effectiveness in increasing product attractiveness for neophilics. The results suggest that for the introduction of new food products it may be efficient to target neophilics and neophobics separately with different strategies. Concise slogans that convey only one message seem to work better than a paradoxical combination of statements in a combined slogan. Slogans aimed at food neophilics need to stress the newness of a product. However, slogans alone seem to be inefficient for neophobics.