The Purchase Decision Hierarchy (PDH™) methodology provides insight into how consumers cognitively structure a category. This insight allows clients to organize their shelf sets more effectively to reflect the way consumers think of their products.

Organizing shelves in the same way consumers organize or group product choices means that consumers can shop the category more easily – leading to increased sales and profitability.

The PDH™ methodology:

• Allows clients to clearly understand the consumer decision process
• Lays out, in simple graphic form, the most efficient shelf configuration for the category
• Reveals the layers in the purchase decision process, indicating how easy – or hard – it will be to extend a product line into other areas of the category

PDH™ eliminates disadvantages of other methods that are commonly used to analyze consumer decision making.

• Many methods require consumers to analyze and communicate how they make decisions – tasks that are known to be difficult for many consumers.
• Sales-based models use household data –blurring differences between individuals within a household and therefore muddying conclusions.