Using loyalty card data to understand the impact of weather on click & collect behaviours in UK retailing

Abstract

ABSTRACT This study assesses the influence of weather on Click & Collect (C&C) usage in England, examining differences between the day of order and day of collection, and how the weather influences the time taken to collect an order. Using sales and loyalty card data from a national retailer, we employ a series of gradient boosting models to analyse the influence of weather on daily order/collection totals, totals stratified by demographic group, and the time taken to collect an order. Weather is found to be consistently more influential on the day of order than the day of collection, however store location and thetiming of purchase have a higher relative influence than weather overall. The findings also evidence significant differences in influence between male and female customers and those aged above and below 65. Temperature and humidity are typically the most influential weather conditions, demonstrating a wide variation in effect on order totals. Temperature was also found to be significantly more influential than other weather conditions on the time taken to collect an order, with the highest temperatures leading to the longest collection times. Understanding the influences of different weather conditions on online consumption behaviours is of significant value to retailers, policy makers and associated stakeholders. However, it is an area that has been significantly under-researched compared to physical retailing, often due to a lack of reliable data. This study provides key insights into how different types of consumers behave on these platforms.