An Indian Perspective of Insights into Consumers’ Preference for Electric Cars

Purpose: This paper highlights on determining the important factors contributing towards the purchase of electric cars. Consumers are largely affected by the environmental concerns and increasing fuel prices of petrol and diesel in their decision making process. An attempt has been made to study whether significant differences exist between the different variables used for study in this paper. There are other factors which have been not considered at all by the consumers like electric cars can be conveniently charged at home or workplaces, the running cost and maintenance cost and registration cost and free road tax on electric cars is much lower than an equivalent petrol/diesel car. However, these factors are to be treated as ‘to be watched factors’ as they might become critical factors at any point of time.

Design/Methodology/Approach: The design/methodology/approach undertaken is as follows:

Data Collection: A questionnaire was prepared and the data was collected by administering the questionnaire on the selected sample by posting a link on the whats app, Bol de app or through e mails.

Sample Size: The sample size of the survey is around 217 respondents. Out of these 217 respondents, 103 respondents were females and 114 respondents were males. The sample unit consists of respondents ranging from housewives, entrepreneurs (male and female), salaried working males and females, female and male students (from the Universities as they are the future prospects), practicing professional males and females, retired people (male and female).

Tools/Techniques used for Data Analysis: The statistical method used is ANOVA (Analysis of Variance) test. It is also called as the F test. ANOVA is used to compare the means of two or more groups. The F statistics helps us to determine whether the differences obtained are statistically significant or not.

Findings: The findings of the research showed that consumers are more prone towards making the environment safe and free from pollutants. This can be seen from the study that they have given weightage to environment consciousness, safe to drive, increasing fuel prices of petrol & diesel and less pollution. Highest average mean is given to environment conscious variable. This signifies that for healthy living, consumers prefer greener options in the form of electric cars which will result into lesser pollution.