Earlier this month, IBM released some interesting findings about grocery shoppers from its new study “Why Advocacy Matters to Grocers,” including:

• 73% of shoppers “feel either antagonistic towards or have no loyalty to their local supermarket”
• 46% feel antagonistic
• Among regular supermarkets, 27% of customers act as advocates, meaning they are “loyal customers who recommend their grocer to others, buy more from their grocer and stay with their grocer instead of going to the competition.” Among specialty supermarkets, however—where more emphasis is placed on delivering a quality shopping experience and an appropriate selection of products—advocacy goes up to 46%.

So what’s a poor grocery store to do when faced with so many indifferent or hostile shoppers? IBM (which has a vested interest in pushing its own customer data program) says,

Clearly the customer loyalty card efforts across the grocery industry have fallen short of their goals as grocers sacrifice customer experience to focus on lower prices.

Whether friend or foe, all shoppers identified the following attributes as important factors in how they feel about their grocer:

• quality
• selection
• employees
• product availability
• social responsibility

We would just appreciate it if the cashiers didn’t always treat us with theatrical displays of contempt when we check out. We’re also surprised there’s no mention of crowding or store layout—in NYC at least, the markets are almost always 1/5th the size of “normal” stores, and god help you if you go on a Saturday afternoon.

“IBM Survey Finds Grocery Industry Falls Short in Building Loyalty With Customers” [IBM via USA Today]
(Photo: Getty)

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