Winning Consumers’ Mission-Driven Shopping Trips
It’s clear that consumers have more choices than ever when it comes to how they spend their retail dollars. Many sectors within retail compete for the same consumer dollars, whether it be convenience, grocery or general merchandise. Consumers have also quickly realized that with all of these choices, they no longer need to simply shop one retailer for everything; they can mix and match. This “patchwork” of the retail customer journey is easily adoptable by savvy consumers who recognize the strengths of each retail brand and how to source their total basket from multiple locations.
On a recent webinar by Placer.ai on trends in the grocery space, they mentioned that for Thanksgiving grocery trips, many consumers preferred to source their ingredients from multiple retailers instead of doing their shopping at one grocer. For example, they might source their meat and produce from Costco, dairy from Aldi, specialty items from Trader Joe’s and then fill in the gaps at their local supermarket. This can also hold true in general merchandise. I rarely see consumers purchase a head-to-toe look from one retailer. Instead, they shop different brands based on specialty, quality and price to create something unique and personal to them. In many ways, this once again drives home the point that consumers are the drivers of trends within retail and have a lot of discernment over their purchases.
Instead of trying to build loyalty with consumers to only shop their brand, it’s imperative that the retail industry understand this fundamental change in consumer behavior and really hone in on their value proposition and specialty within the industry.