The Influence of Shopping Trolleys on Customers Behavior in Grocery Stores

March 7, 2019

Grocery stores and the retail industry as a whole are very interested in ways to improve services to their customers, and in techniques and equipment that can also increase sales. Interestingly, research has been conducted on the influence of shopping trolleys on customers’ behaviour in grocery stores. The results of the study reveals interesting information that owners and managers of grocery stores can use to make their stores more accommodating for customers, and more profitable.

Research shows that the layout of grocery stores and the type of shopping trolleys available have an impact on the purchasing behaviour of shoppers, and on shopping trolley parking behaviour. In grocery stores that had wider aisles, shoppers navigated more conveniently and freely, compared to stores that had narrower aisle space.

When shopping aisle were crowded, and the movement of shoppers were restricted because of lack of space to navigate, customers will often park their trolleys at the end of an aisle, to be able to reach the items they want to purchase on foot. Interesting to note, customers who parked their shopping trolleys were more likely to purchase more items than those who stayed with their trolleys.

This has suggested that the space between aisles does not have as a significant influence as previously believed on the purchase behaviour of shoppers. Shopping trolleys in grocery stores are provided to allow shoppers to temporarily store items before purchasing them, which frees up their hands to allow patrons to touch merchandise, resulting in shoppers purchasing more products.

What actually hinders shoppers is not necessarily the layout of grocery stores, or a lack of shopping trolleys, but the size of the shopping trolleys. Studies have shown that grocery store shoppers seek mobility, and are willing to park their trolleys if necessary to reach the items they want to purchase.

While parked shopping trolleys can be a hindrance to other shoppers, grocery stores might consider introducing more medium-sized shopping trolleys to limit the amount of large trolleys that take up more space. By doing this, grocery stores would not need to create more space between aisle, and more space would be available to shoppers so they would not have to park their trolleys to reach the items they want to purchase.

Research has also shown that when available, shopper who only wanted to purchase limited amount of items would use shopping baskets instead of a shopping trolley. This allowed shoppers to be more mobile, getting the items they wanted to buy and navigating more easily to the cashier without a shopping trolley.

With this information, grocery stores are recommended to provide their customers a choice of various sizes of shopping trolleys and shopping baskets, which can be purchased or leased conveniently from SOS Retail Sales.

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