Grocers’ Most Loyal Shoppers Are Optimistic About Inflation

Amid inflation, grocers’ best customers see a light at the end of the tunnel.

The Context

Rising food prices have threatened shopper loyalty, with consumers looking for ways to stretch their budgets. It makes sense, then, that those who have remained the most loyal are those who expect that these inflationary challenges to be over sooner than later.

In a recent interview with PYMNTS, Sean Turner, co-founder and CTO at retail technology company Swiftly, spoke to how inflation is prompting consumers to switch merchants.

“Shoppers are clipping more coupons,” Turner said, noting consumers are more focused on planning their grocery shopping trips. “They’re really trying to compare prices across different stores. They might go to the Walmart website or app and see what the product costs there, then launch one of our retailer’s apps like Save Mart’s app or the 99 Cents Only app and search for the same product there to see where it’s cheapest or where they can get a coupon or a discount.”

As such, grocers are doing everything in their power to build stronger relationships with their customers. Take, for instance, grocery giant Kroger. In a ShopTalk 2023 discussion, Yael Cosset, the retailer’s chief information officer and senior vice president, spoke to the company’s loyalty-driving efforts, per a recent announcement.

“Kroger pioneered the personalization approach because we wanted to understand how customers engaged with our offers to make them better and more relevant,” Cosset said. “Our best-in-class data science program creates personalized experiences that provide important savings on the very specific items we know our customers love.”

By the Numbers

For the latest edition of the Consumer Inflation Sentiment report, “Consumer Inflation Sentiment: The False Appeal of Deal-Chasing Consumers,” PYMNTS surveyed more than 2,100 United States consumers in February to get a clearer sense of how inflation has been affecting their shopping habits and relationships with retailers. The results revealed that consumers who are loyal to their go-to grocers are more optimistic about when inflation will level off than those who are more willing to switch merchants.

Specifically, loyal grocery customers on average believe that inflation will stabilize by late June 2024. In contrast, consumers who choose their grocery merchant based on which retailer offers the best prices or deals believe that it will not stabilize until late December 2024, and shoppers who look to strike a balance between loyalty and deal chasing estimate early November.