Abstract
Since the 1990s, the government administrations have thought that supermarkets could replace traditional retail markets as the commercial facilities for daily shopping in Taiwan. However, traditional retail markets remained prosperous. This paper aims to investigate the followings: 1) whether traditional retail markets still play an important role in residents’ daily shopping and 2) whether supermarkets and traditional retail markets are actually complementary rather than competitive as commercial facilities for daily shopping. The examination is based on the data regarding married women’s daily shopping behaviours in a planned residential area in Taipei from a questionnaire carried out in 2007. Several things are concluded below. First, consumers do not definitely choose the new types of facilities for daily shopping. Second, supermarkets in residential areas may be complementary to traditional retail markets in residents’ daily shopping. Third, traditional retail market plays a role beyond acting as the exchange space for goods. Fourth, even though cars are popular in Taiwan, married women still prefer to conduct their daily shopping inside or nearby their neighbourhood unit by walking. This paper suggests it is necessary to maintain diversity rather than to anticipate or limit the type of commercial facilities available for daily shopping in residential planning.
Highlights
Mainstream supermarket chains and hypermarkets such as Carrefour emerged in Taiwan beginning in the 1980s and, originally, government administrators or local planning boards thought supermarkets would be able to replace traditional retail markets
In this study we focus on the daily shopping activities of married women to observe their behaviours in traditional retail markets and in the new type of community commercial facilities such as supermarkets and hypermarkets, the former having existed before the introduction of modern urban planning theories and the latter having increased in prevalence since the 1980s
Even if the type of shops where people can conduct their daily shopping changes, it does not mean that consumers will definitely choose the new types of facilities such as supermarkets or hypermarkets
Summary
Mainstream supermarket chains and hypermarkets such as Carrefour emerged in Taiwan beginning in the 1980s and, originally, government administrators or local planning boards thought supermarkets would be able to replace traditional retail markets. Article 7 of the Taipei Retail Market Management Regulations was amended to develop planned market-lands into public supermarkets in 1990. In many cities and rural areas, traditional retail markets remained prosperous. Many studies with different perspectives have been conducted such as studies focused on the use of hypermarkets [1] and on consumers’ habits and interrelated activities in a large downtown shopping centre [2]. In this study we focus on the daily shopping activities of married women to observe their behaviours in traditional retail markets and in the new type of community commercial facilities such as supermarkets and hypermarkets, the former having existed before the introduction of modern urban planning theories and the latter having increased in prevalence since the 1980s. We aim 1) to discuss a The draft version of this paper has been presented at the 3th International Conference on Built Environment in Developing Countries, Malaysia, 2011
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