THE INFLUENCE OF PRICE, SERVICE QUALITY, AND LIFESTYLE ON THE PURCHASE DECISION OF ORNAMENTAL PLANTS DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC (A Study on Visitors of Madirsan Flower Tourism Village)

Consumer purchase decisions, whether to buy a product or not, are influenced by several key factors, including service quality, lifestyle, and price. This holds true for the current trend of increased ornamental plant purchases, particularly during the pandemic, which has notably boosted sales at the Madirsan Flower Tourism Village. This study's primary objectives were to assess the impact of price, service quality, and lifestyle on the purchasing decisions related to ornamental plants within the Madirsan Flower Tourism Village during the COVID-19 pandemic. Quantitative research methods were employed, with a sample of 100 respondents from the Medan and Deli Serdang regions, selected using the classical formula for sampling. Data were collected via questionnaires using the Likert scale, and the analysis involved instrument testing, classical assumption testing, multiple linear regression analysis, and hypothesis testing through tools like MS Excel and SPSS 23. The findings of this research underscore that price, service quality, and lifestyle all play significant and positive roles in influencing purchasing decisions among the residents of Medan City and Deli Serdang. This suggests that businesses operating within the ornamental plant sector should consider these factors carefully to optimize their strategies, especially in the context of the ongoing pandemic.


INTRODUCTION
The tourism industry in Indonesia has been experiencing a remarkable surge in growth over recent years.Not only has it become an integral part of the country's economy, but it has also evolved into one of the primary sectors contributing significantly to Indonesia's foreign exchange earnings.The allure of Indonesian tourism extends beyond its extraordinary natural resources; it is equally indebted to its human resources, which play a pivotal role in catering to the needs and desires of travelers from across the globe.
Tourism is not just about seeking tranquility or experiencing a change of scenery (Rahman, 2022).It serves as a means for individuals to find respite from their daily routines, to gain a deeper appreciation of the beauty of nature, and to facilitate crosscultural interactions among people of diverse nationalities and social backgrounds.The robust infrastructure support, emanating from local communities, private enterprises, and regional governments, has laid a sturdy foundation for the tourism industry's continuous expansion.Consequently, this sector not only augments foreign exchange revenues but also creates business opportunities, opens doors to employment, and fuels economic growth, especially in remote areas of the country.
However, this remarkable growth trajectory encountered an unprecedented hurdle with the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic.As a global pandemic, COVID-19 unleashed its profound impact across nearly every economic sector, with tourism being no exception.Various tourism-related services witnessed a stark decline in the number of visitors, resulting in a substantial reduction in revenue (Paramita & Putra, 2020).While most segments of the tourism industry grappled with this downward spiral, the Bunga Bangun Sari Flower Tourism Village in Madirsan, Deli Serdang Regency, North Sumatra Province, defied the odds by experiencing a surge in visitor numbers during this challenging period.
Furthermore, the phenomenon of a significant surge in ornamental plant prices during the pandemic has captured the attention of researchers, prompting a more profound analysis.Price, as Lubis & Tarigan (2015) suggests, serves not only as a tool to facilitate sales but also as a means to establish a lasting image for a product or service.Beyond its role in sales, price wields significant influence over consumer behavior.Consequently, this research endeavors to investigate the repercussions of price hikes on the purchasing decisions of visitors amid the COVID-19 pandemic within the Bunga Bangun Sari Flower Tourism Village.Additionally, it seeks to delve into the multifaceted role of price in shaping consumer behavior within this specific context.Ultimately, the objective is to offer invaluable insights into how alterations in pricing can sway purchasing choices and inform strategic decision-making in the tourism industry during the challenging times imposed by a pandemic.

LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1. Price
Price can signify the brand quality of a product, where consumers often perceive that higher-priced items equate to better product quality.Generally, price has a positive influence on product quality.As per Tjiptono (2014), price is the amount of money (monetary unit) and/or other aspects (non-monetary) that contain certain utility/usefulness necessary to acquire a product.According to Abdullah & Tantri (2018), price is an amount of money exchanged for a product or service.Furthermore, it represents a value that consumers exchange for benefits by owning or using a product or service.

Service Quality
Service quality represents a consumer's evaluation of the level of service received compared to the expected level of service.Positive effects of good service include increased decision-making, customer loyalty, and a desire to make repeat purchases (Laksana, 2017).In this context, quality means when various factors meet consumer expectations.Based on the above definition, in other words, quality is a form of measurement of the value of services received by consumers and the dynamic condition of a product or service in meeting consumer expectations.Services can be exchanged through buying and selling but cannot be physically felt.

Lifestyle
Lifestyle, in a broad sense, is an individual's way of living, which tends to involve their activities and interests within their environment and what they consider significant for themselves and their surroundings.According to Kotler et al. (2014), lifestyle is an individual's pattern of living as expressed through activities, interests, and opinions.From these definitions of lifestyle, it can be concluded that lifestyle is an individual's activities, interests, and opinions that depict their way of life within their environment.An individual's desired lifestyle affects purchasing decisions and can even change that individual's lifestyle.

Purchase Decision
According to Kotler & Keller (2016), a purchase decision is a problem-solving process that consists of analyzing or recognizing needs and desires, searching for information, assessing sources of selection for purchase alternatives, purchase decision, and post-purchase behavior.Typically, consumer purchase decisions involve buying the most preferred brand.Hence, consumer purchase decision-making is a process of selecting one solution among several problem-solving alternatives based on actual follow-through.As per Adinda (2020:63), purchase decision is defined as buying the preferred brand.

Covid-19 Pandemic
The Covid-19 pandemic refers to the global spread of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (abbreviated as COVID-19) to all countries.This disease is caused by a new type of coronavirus named SARS-CoV-2 (Organization, 2020).The COVID-19 outbreak was first detected in the city of Wuhan, Hubei Province, China, on December 1, 2019, and was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO) on March 11, 2020.As of November 14, 2020, more than 53,281,350 cases have been reported in over 219 countries and territories worldwide, resulting in more than 1,301,021 fatalities and more than 34,394,214 recoveries based on data provided by the WHO, a global health organization.

RESEARCH METHODS
In developing this research methodology, an associative approach was chosen to analyze the correlations or relationships between the variables under investigation.Associative research aims to understand the extent to which factors such as price, service quality, and lifestyle can influence the purchasing decisions of visitors in a situation marked by the COVID-19 pandemic.According to Suliyanto & MM (2018), a quantitative approach is used because it is grounded in the philosophy of positivism, which emphasizes empirical observation and statistical analysis in research.The quantitative method allows research to focus on a specific population or sample and gather data through structured research instruments (Sugiyono, 2018).
To collect data, researchers employed a quantitative method involving the use of questionnaires or structured surveys.These instruments were used to systematically collect data from a selected sample of the target population.The collected data were then subjected to rigorous statistical analysis.The primary objective of this data analysis is to test hypotheses formulated earlier, with a focus on the influence of various factors, such as price, service quality, and lifestyle, on the purchasing decisions of visitors during the COVID-19 pandemic.This approach is expected to provide a deep understanding of how these factors interact and play a role in shaping consumer behavior in the tourism industry during a pandemic situation.1 above, the partial effects of each variable can be seen as follows: a.Based on the test results using Statistical Software, the testing results related to the Price Influence variable have a significant effect on purchase decisions.This can be observed from the significant value of the Price Influence variable, where sig is 0.965 > 0.005, and the t-value is 0.245.With these results, Ha1 can be accepted.Therefore, it can be concluded that the Price Influence variable significantly affects the Purchase Decision variable (Y).b.Based on the test results using Statistical Software, the testing results related to the Service Quality (X2) variable have a significant effect on purchase decisions.This can be observed from the significant value of the Service Quality variable, where t-test > t-table (6.551 > 1.661) and sig is 0.000 < 0.05.With these results, Ha2 can be accepted.Therefore, it can be concluded that the Service Quality variable significantly affects the Purchase Decision variable (Y).c.Based on the test results using Statistical Software, the testing results related to the Lifestyle (X3) variable have a significant effect on the Purchase Decision (Y).This can be observed from the significant value of the Lifestyle variable, where the t-value is 4.414 > 1.661.With these results, Ha3 can be accepted.Therefore, it can be concluded that the Lifestyle variable significantly affects the Purchase Decision variable (Y).d.Based on the test results using Statistical Software, it can be seen that the Price Influence, Service Quality, and Lifestyle variables have a significant effect on the Purchase Decision.Based on Table 2 above, the calculated F-value obtained is 159.084.Where the calculated F-value is greater than the tabulated F-value, specifically 159.084 > 2.47, and the significance value (sig) is 0.000 < 0.05.This means that collectively, the variables Price Influence (X1), Service Quality (X2), and Lifestyle (X3) have a positive and significant influence on Purchase Decision (Y).Therefore, Ha is accepted.Based on the research on the Price Influence variable, the researcher found that the majority of visitors to Madirsan Flower Tourism Village agree that the Price Influence variable on Purchase Decision in Madirsan Flower Tourism Village, as studied in this research, is good.This is evident from the respondents' positive responses to the questionnaire consisting of 8 statements regarding the Price Influence, which describe whether it is good or bad for the visitors to Madirsan Flower Tourism Village being studied.
Based on the t-test results, the Price Influence variable has a positive and significant impact on the purchase decision of visitors to Madirsan Flower Tourism Village.This is confirmed by the test results with a t-value for the Price Influence variable of 0.245.Using the t-table, the t-value obtained is 1.661.Therefore, since the t-value is less than the ttable value, H01 is rejected, and Ha1 is accepted.Based on the multiple linear regression analysis conducted using statistical software, it was found that when the Price Influence is increased by one unit, the purchase decision also increases by 0.425.This research result aligns with the study conducted by Ucong Boston Simanjuntak (2018) titled "The Influence of Lifestyle, Promotion Price, and Product Quality on the Purchase Decision of Oppo Smartphones among Students of the Faculty of Nursing, Universitas Sumatera Utara," which stated that the Price has a significant impact on purchase decisions.This result indicates that the price affects the decisions they make when purchasing.Most of the respondents' analysis results show agreement in buying ornamental plants because the offered price matches the benefits received.Price is one of the factors that can influence consumer purchasing decisions.If the benefits received by the consumer are greater than

Table 3 : Coefficient of Determination Results (R 2 Test)
Based on Table3, the following observations can be made: a.The value of R is 0.912, which means that the relationship between Price Influence (X1), Service Quality (X2), and Lifestyle (X3) accounts for 91%.This indicates a strong relationship between these variables.b.The value of R Square is 0.833, indicating that 83.3% of the purchase decisions of visitors to the Madirsan flower tourism village can be influenced by Price, Service Quality, and Lifestyle.The remaining 16.7% is influenced by other variables not included in this study.