By: John Lezcano, Creative Director, FMI
Don't Panic! This is not an emergency — more like a warning that grocery shopping trends today are influenced by everyone, regardless of age or single/partnered status.
What's more, now, more than ever before, value is making a splash on grocery store aisles. But "value" these days is not solely based on "cheddar" or "greens" (add your own money slang here) and more on convenience, relevance, quality and/or experience.
To put it bluntly, grocery shopping is more about what you get out of it and less about how much you have to "fork" over. That's all according to our U.S. Grocery Shopper Trends: Finding Value report.
How I Connect to The Finding Value Trends
I am a single, 60-year-old shopper (SOS) who plans all the meals for the household, which includes Oliver, my 11-year-old Lhasa Apso. Hey, that's my family!
In my continuous life goal of having a lower carbon footprint, convenience and relevance play a big part in my grocery shopping. I walk to the nearest food retailer, which happens to be a co-op. They provide environmentally friendly packaging, socially conscious products and no fossil fuels are used to get there.
When it comes to quality, I focus on items that provide maximum health and well-being for me with minimum prep time. That ranges from packaged goods low in sodium to organic produce high in fiber — I am 60 years old, after all!
Experience also plays a big part in defining what shoppers find valuable. For me, the checkout process can bring high anxiety levels comparable to waiting in line at the DMV. I prefer a food retailer that offers self-checkouts because the wait times are usually shorter, and I can organize my purchases into reusable bags for better weight distribution, making it easier to walk home from the store — something that's very important to me because my walk is often a high-wire balancing act and I don't want my eggs and tomatoes to plummet to their deaths!
The Takeaway
This is the part when Jerry Maguire yells, "Show me the money!" That's the thing: Value is not defined as only getting "more bang for my buck" but instead as what that buck can get me when grocery shopping. I am not alone in this as I make up 13% of single male shoppers who have their own style of grocery shopping and definition of value.
So, as you strut through the aisles, posing your best "Blue Steel," looking for your favorite items, take pride in how you define "value." Value is the new black, and it's a trend that will only get bigger in this ever-changing world of grocery shopping. You've been warned!
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