Consumers' priorities for flame retardant protection [Flammable Fabrics Act]

Although home economists and members of the textile industry recognize the needfor con sumer feedback, limited information is available regarding consumer reactions to flame retardant fabrics (FRF). The concept of the tradeoffs of other fabric and garment characteristics necessary to provide FRF has been virtually ignored. In this report, we com pared consumers' priorities for flame retardant protection (FRP) with and without tradeoffs of other fabric and garment characteristics. A mail survey was made of a stratified systematic sample of residents in an urban area in South Louisiana. Data analysis, using summed scores from the 104 usable responses, revealed a highly significant difference in the women's priorities for FRP with and without tradeoffs of other garment and fabric characteristics. More of the women were willing to trade off aesthetic than performance characteristics, and more of them were willing to trade off at least one of the ten listed characteristics to have FRP in personal wear than to have it in outer wear. The exploratory findings were used to suggest ideas for future hypothesis testing. Apparently consumers respond differently when a product charac teristic is presented alone and in combination with other characteristics. Therefore, we believe that the concept of tradeoffs should be included in future investigations.