Consumer price knowledge in the German retail market

Price knowledge as a construct has been one of the top behavioral pricing themes in the last four decades, especially in the Anglo‐American literature. In Germany, scientists have paid relatively little attention to this topic during the last 15 years – with some notable exceptions. Therefore, this study analyzes German consumers' price knowledge and, by doing so, replicates and extends existing international work. After reviewing earlier attempts at assessing the construct, a measure is developed for the price estimation error “PEE”, based on explicit price knowledge stored in long‐term memory. Results, including data from about 1,000 consumers on 69 products from a German retail chain, indicate that price knowledge in Germany is relatively low. Based on that observation, implications for the management are discussed.