Chain, Voluntary Chain, and Independent Grocery Store Prices, 1930 and 1934

Abstract

EARLY in the month of October, I930, the writer personally visited the chain grocery stores, voluntary chain grocery stores, and independent grocery stores of five towns in central New York State to obtain factual material to be used as a basis for a comparison of prices among these three types of stores.2 In each store prices were obtained on a number (75) of standard grocery items, the great majority of them being branded (68 out of 75), these prices being recorded on printed forms. Upon detailed analysis of the price quotations for 63 of the 75 items (I 2 were dropped because of a lack of a sufficient number of quotations), it was found that the chain stores were giving a saving of I 2.3 per cent as compared with the independent stores, while the voluntary chain members were underselling the independents by approximately 3 per cent.3 In order to test the validity of the 63 items which were used as a basis of comparison, i.e., validity in the sense of being good indicators of the price differentials which actually exist throughout all the branded goods carried, a weighted index was made for one of the five towns (Earlville). In this town the unweighted index of the percentage savings of the chain over the independent was found to be i i per cent. With the co-operation of one of the chains operating stores in this section of New York State, dollar sales figures were obtained for the preceding three months on each of the 63 items. After putting these sales on a per store basis, the