44% of UK Grocery Shoppers Spend More at Stores With Loyalty Programs

U.K. grocers, like most retailers, saw their proportion of online sales soar with the onset of the pandemic in early 2020.

This surge leveled off somewhat as the pandemic dragged on, but many consumers continue to buy groceries online as a matter of convenience and habit.  The increase in online shopping is prompting U.K. grocers to revamp business practices, such as adding more nongrocery items to their shelves. They are also enhancing the value proposition they offer shoppers with loyalty programs that reward repeat customers.

These are just some of the key findings from What U.K. Consumers Expect From Their Grocery Shopping Experiences, a PYMNTS and ACI collaboration. To come up with the data for this second part of a two-part study about payments in the grocery industry, we surveyed 2,501 U.K. consumers from Sept. 14 to Sept. 17 about their preferences for buying groceries both online and in-store. We sought to learn how shoppers adjusted their grocery shopping habits as the pandemic progressed and how retailers responded to hold onto customers’ loyalty.

More key findings from the study include:

Forty-eight percent of U.K. consumers who buy groceries currently make the purchases online.The online shoppers use a wide array of methods for purchasing and delivery. Forty percent buy groceries online and have them delivered to their homes, while 11% pick them up at the grocer after shopping online. Four percent buy online via a subscription service, and 3% use curbside pickup after making the purchase online. An additional 3% buy online through a third-party reseller.

Sixty-four percent of the U.K.’s grocery shoppers say they continue to buy groceries online because they fear infection, which indicates the degree to which the pandemic still alters consumers’ behavior. Overall, consumers are looking for easy and convenient methods of shopping, and 66% of the U.K.’s report doing more grocery shopping online for these reasons. Forty percent and 49% of consumers cited good online shopping experiences and speed, respectively, to explain why they continue buying groceries online.

Most U.K. consumers still prefer to buy perishable items at the store. Sixty-four percent buy their meat at the store, and 68% buy fresh fruit and vegetables at the store. Even when it comes to packaged foods, for which spoilage is not a concern, 62% of consumers still want to buy the items at the store.

Grocers in the U.K. have used much of the pandemic to adapt to consumers’ changing behaviors. This experience has taught grocers to let customers conveniently shop both online and in-store and provide fast and reliable shopping experiences. PYMNTS’ research shows that grocers with loyalty programs seem to have an edge over those without them and that loyalty programs give customers a reason to become repeat shoppers and increase their spending.

To learn more about how U.K. grocers are meeting the demands of online shoppers, download the report.