Study reveals the secret life of a supermarket shopper
Wearable cameras enable researchers to track patterns such as when consumers shift focus from their shopping lists and begin looking at unplanned or unfamiliar product choices.
The average American shops for food twice a week, and collectively spends about $600 billion a year at the checkout. And, with brick-and-mortar outlets increasingly trying to outsell their web-based competitors, it’s critical for food retailers to discern precisely when and where to offer that ethnic cooking demonstration or that free taste of some new protein-enriched paleo latte mix.
“We’re interested in how the customer’s journey evolves during a shopping trip,” says Szu-chi Huang, associate professor of marketing at Stanford GSB, Stanford, Calif.