To Win Grocery Shoppers’ Loyalty Today, Brands Must Think Brick-and-Mortar, Data Shows

While grocers’ digital strategies are key to their long-term futures, securing the majority of consumers’ loyalty in the here and now means maintaining a top-tier in-store experience. Research from a new PYMNTS study, Decoding Customer Affinity: The Customer Loyalty to Merchants Survey 2022, created in collaboration with Toshiba Global Commerce Solutions, which featured the results of a census-balanced survey of more than 2,000 U.S. consumers in late fall 2021, found that 82% of grocery shoppers’ most frequent purchasing method is still in-store shopping.

Get the full report: Decoding Consumer Affinity: The Customer Loyalty To Merchants Survey 2022

Additionally, the study found that the features most likely to keep shoppers coming back are largely tied to this brick-and-mortar experience. For instance, while having friendly staff would boost the loyalty of 51% of shoppers and opening up a store nearer to the consumer’s home would do the same for 45%, online purchasing capability would only increase the loyalty of 23%.

Of course, this does not mean grocers should neglected their digital capabilities or slow their digital growth — far from it. Forty-two percent of shoppers are looking for loyalty programs with appealing rewards and a far-from-negligible 19% want an app with in-store capabilities, and the share of consumers looking for digital features is likely to rise in years ahead.

“You look at a grocery store and just stand in an aisle and watch people shop — the human behavior you see in the store doesn’’ look a lot different than it did 10 years ago, or 20 or 50 years ago,” John Ross, president and CEO of the Independent Grocers Alliance (IGA), told PYMNTS in an interview in December. “That doesn’t mean the shopper is the same, and those shoppers have a digital relationship with most of the brands and services in their lives, and so their expectation of our industry to be able to have a digital connection with them is growing and growing and growing.”

See also: Supermarkets Rethink Physical and Digital Aisles for Grocery’s Connected Future

Granted, the single most important feature to consumers influencing their loyalty to the grocers they shop at is price, with the vast majority — 77% — of consumers listing low prices as a factor that would improve their loyalty to grocers, followed by the 52% of shoppers that would be swayed by promotions and discounts.

No surprise, then, that Costco has far and away the most loyal customers. While the members-only big-box retailer does not quite make the top five most-frequented grocers, the customers it does have are incredibly devoted, with 87% — more than any other brand — rating themselves as “very” or “extremely” loyal. For contrast, Walmart, the top grocer, has far less loyal customers, with only 49% of its shoppers saying the same.

The competition for these grocery shoppers — brick-and-mortar customers, especially — is stiff. The study found that, while the vast majority of consumers who primarily shop for groceries online tend to purchase from just one or two merchants, almost half of those who shop in stores tend to shop with three or more different brands. With so many choices available to consumers, grocers need to be sure to provide a compelling in-store experience to meet shoppers’ needs today as well as simple, convenient ecommerce options to ensure their longevity.