Online Grocery Market Research Articles

Online grocery shopping adoption versus non-adoption among the over-50s in Germany

Online grocery shopping (OGS) has significantly risen due to accelerated retail digitization and reshaped consumer shopping behaviors over the last years. Despite this trend, the German online grocery market lags behind its international counterparts. Notably, with almost half of the German population aged over 50 and the 55–64 age group emerging as the largest user segment in e-commerce, the over-50 demographic presents an attractive yet relatively overlooked audience for the expansion of the online grocery market. However, research on OGS behavior among German over-50s is scarce. This study addresses this gap, empirically investigating OGS adoption factors within this demographic through an online survey with 179 respondents. Our findings reveal that over a third of the over-50 demographic has embraced OGS, indicating a growing receptivity for OGS among the over-50s. Notably, home delivery, product variety, convenience, and curiosity emerged as primary drivers for OGS adoption among this demographic. Surprisingly, most adopters did not increase online grocery orders since 2020 and a not inconsiderable proportion have even stopped buying groceries online again. For potential OGS adopters, regional product availability turned out as a motivator, signaling substantial growth potential and providing online grocers with strategic opportunities to target this demographic. In light of our research, we offer practical suggestions to online grocery retailers, aiming to overcome barriers and capitalize on key drivers identified in our study for sustained growth in the over-50 market segment.

Current Trends in Online Grocery Shopping

The convenience and accessibility of online shopping have revolutionized the retail industry, with online grocery shopping experiencing significant growth in recent years. This research paper explores the current trends in online grocery shopping, focusing on key factors driving its popularity and the challenges it faces. By analyzing consumer behavior, technological advancements, and market dynamics, this study aims to provide valuable insights into the evolving landscape of e-commerce within the grocery sector. The research delves into the shifting preferences of consumers towards online grocery shopping, emphasizing the convenience, time-saving benefits, and extensive product range offered by digital platforms. Furthermore, it examines the impact of changing lifestyles, especially in urban areas, on the rising demand for online grocery services. The study also addresses the crucial role of data analytics and AI-driven technologies in enhancing the customer experience and optimizing supply chain management for online grocery retailers. Moreover, the paper investigates the challenges associated with online grocery shopping, including issues related to delivery logistics, product quality, and customer satisfaction. It discusses strategies adopted by online retailers to overcome these challenges and build trust among consumers. Additionally, the research highlights the competitive landscape of the online grocery market, analyzing the strategies employed by key players to stay ahead in this rapidly evolving industry.

Societal Implications of Personalized Pricing in Online Grocery Shopping

Attention to big data analytics is ubiquitous and growing given the online shopping revolution and its potential to generate individual-specific actionable datasets which were previously unavailable or cumbersome to cultivate. However, the food industry has not drawn much attention to discussions of individualized pricing strategies using online grocery datasets. Considering growth of the online grocery market and consumers data abundance to grocers, this brief viewpoint article focuses on potentials of incorporating big data analytics into pricing strategies in online grocery markets. This discussion informs of various practices of big data analytics and ultimately calls to attention the potential for personalized pricing in online food markets. This article proposes the need for empirical analysis and developing research agendas investigating impacts of personalized pricing on market efficiencies, which is not as unambiguous in practices as it is theoretically. In addition, the status of online groceries, concepts of price differentiation, societal, economic, and regulatory implications of personalized pricing are discussed.

Meesho: reselling in the grocery or e-commerce segment?

Learning outcomes The learning outcomes of this case study are as follows: to understand the concept of social commerce and how it is different from e-commerce business, to discuss the unique features of Meesho’s social commerce model, to understand concepts of entrepreneurship (e.g. addressing the gap through business, pivoting), to understand the dynamics of online grocery market and e-commerce market and to apply business strategy concepts to make recommendations. Case overview/synopsis This case study presents Meesho, an organization in social commerce in India. Meesho was founded by Indian Institute of Technology graduates Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Barnwal in the year 2015 to help the small business owners with online selling. It was initially launched as an app that connected local retailers to the customers. Owing to low customer interest and low profit margins, they pivoted the business to a reseller app that facilitated the individuals and small retailers to resell the wholesalers’ products (unbranded and long-tail products) to the customers on social media channels. However, the tough competition from other start-ups in social commerce and retail giants such as Amazon and Flipkart who targeted the same customers impacted their growth. After receiving a funding of US$300m, the founders were considering if they should enter the e-commerce market and directly compete with giants such as Amazon and Flipkart or extend the product line to the online groceries market and compete with dominant players such as BigBasket and Blinkit. Through this case study, the students could be provided an opportunity to evaluate a situation, apply the strategic management concepts and make a recommendation on the strategic plan. Complexity academic level The case study can be taught in the business and strategy courses at the graduate and postgraduate levels in business schools. It is also suitable for the entrepreneurship course with focus on e-commerce start-up and sustainability, which is also taught at the MBA level. This case study can also be used in executive development programs for abovementioned courses. Supplementary materials Teaching notes are available for educators only. Subject code CSS 11: Strategy.

A STUDY ON SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGIES FOR ONLINE GROCERY SHOPPING CART AT BIG BASKET BANGALORE

Online grocery spending has been increasingly popular in current years as a outcome of the expansion of e- commerce, which has completely changed how customers interact with retail platforms. Businesses are looking for imaginative ways to improve their social media occurrence and interconnect with customers as the online grocery industry gets more competitive. This research explores the world of social media strategies designed especially for Big Basket's online grocery store, a significant player in the online grocery market.

Designing shipping policies with top‐up options to qualify for free delivery

Motivated by the booming online grocery market and the extensive use of contingent free‐shipping (CFS) policies in the e‐grocery industry, we investigate the optimal CFS and pricing decisions for online grocers. Under a CFS policy, consumers enjoy free shipping for orders exceeding a certain threshold value; otherwise, they are charged a flat fee for orders below this threshold. We adopt a utility‐based model to capture consumers' behavior of purchasing additional items to qualify for free shipping under a CFS policy and analyze its impact on policy structure and consumer surplus. We characterize the e‐grocer's optimal pricing and CFS policy and find that consumer heterogeneity and demand distribution lead to different forms of the optimal shipping policy. When consumer heterogeneity is large enough, the optimal policy induces some consumers to top up and may allow some others to ship for free. In this case, the e‐grocer can charge a high‐profit margin. Otherwise, a top‐up option is unnecessary, and a flat‐rate shipping fee policy is optimal. Moreover, while the optimal policy never induces all consumers to top up when they are rational, it is possible to do so when consumers associate some psychological disutility with the shipping fee. Surprisingly, the total consumer surplus under the optimal policy may increase in the latter case. We further model a Stackelberg game between an e‐grocer and an offline channel and find that the difference between the e‐grocer's internal shipping cost and consumers' inconvenience cost of shopping offline is a main driver for market segmentation. Lastly, we show that a subscription‐based free‐shipping program, in addition to the jointly optimized CFS and pricing policy, cannot improve profits when consumers' order size and frequency are independent. Our findings help online grocers make operational and marketing decisions under the impact of consumers' top‐up behavior.

Analysing the Impact of Perceived Risk, Trust and Past Purchase Satisfaction on Repurchase Intentions in Case of Online Grocery Shopping in India

The Indian online grocery market has been propelling since last few years. The size of online grocery market in 2020 was estimated as $2.9 billion and it is further anticipated to reach at the compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 37.1% during 2021 to 2028. Companies such as Amazon, Flipkart grocery, BigBasket, Grofers and Jiomart have been coming up with new attractions for consumers such as providing timely no contact delivery, accepting various digital modes of payment and offering several discounts which have fascinated consumers towards buying their regular grocery from various online platforms. Corona virus has also fuelled up the safety concerns of people; due to which a large section of the citizens are working from home and are dependent on the online platform for various purposes including grocery shopping. This has provided several growth opportunities to the online grocery market. This research investigates about the purchase behaviour of customers towards online grocery shopping. The study aims to understand the purchase behaviour of e-grocery shoppers of India and to examine the association between satisfactions with online purchase, trust on online grocers, perceived risk and online repurchase intention of grocery items. The study uses primary data collected from 555 online grocery buyers. The findings of the study indicate that online customer satisfaction is a significant factor that influences repurchase intentions of online grocery shopping. Perceived risk negatively influence trust as well as repurchase intentions. Trust is found to be a mediating factor between shopping satisfaction and repurchase intentions. The study also builds and tests an online customer behavioural model with actual purchasing behaviour and identifies the continued presence of perceived risk, shopping satisfaction and trust in grocery e-retailing.

Analyzing consumer profile in online grocery market and estimation of the tendency to buy via machine learning

Tüketici davranışları, değişen yaşam koşulları doğrultusunda farklılaşmakta ve sanal market kullanımı her zamankinden daha yüksek bir hızla artmaktadır. Bu durum, pazarda rekabet eden firmaları yeni iş modelleri arayışına yöneltmekte ve sanal market sektöründe rekabet eden ve/veya sektöre yeni girmeyi hedefleyen firmaların hedef müşteri kitlesini anlayabilmeleri, pazar stratejilerini belirlemeleri açısından önem arz etmektedir. Bu çalışmada, sanal market kullanımına yönelen tüketici yapısını anlayabilmek amacı ile bir anket çalışması uygulanmış olup; anket sonuçları istatistiksel çıkarım yöntemleri ile incelenerek, sanal market kullanımını tercih eden tüketicilerin demografik yapısı belirlenmiştir. Daha sonra belirlenen demografik özellikler üzerinden, sınıflandırma problemleri için kullanılan çeşitli makine öğrenmesi teknikleri ile bireylerin sanal market kullanımları tahmin edilmiş ve kullanılan tahmin modelleri doğruluk performans ölçütü ile kıyaslanmıştır. Karşılaştırmalar sonucunda rasgele orman tekniği en yüksek doğruluk oranına ulaşmış olup bireylerin kullanım tercihleri %78 doğrulukla tahmin edilebilmiştir. Bunlara ek olarak, anket cevapları ışığında sanal market sektöründe faaliyet gösteren/gösterecek olan firmalara müşteri memnuniyeti üzerinde etken olabilecek faktörler hakkında bazı iç görüler sunulmuştur. Elde edilen sonuçlar, hızlı ve kullanımı kolay mobil aplikasyonlarla satış sonrası hizmetlerin müşterilerin sanal market kullanımını artırdığını, minimum tutar ve sınırlı teslimat bölgelerinin kullanımı azalttığını göstermiştir.

What do regular online grocery shoppers want from online grocers going forward? Suggestions for service quality improvements

Online grocery shopping has become significantly more popular amid the Covid-19 pandemic. That said, the online grocery market in many European countries is still taking shape and further service developments are needed to meet consumers’ changing and increasing expectations. Based on an analysis of 412 regular online grocery shoppers’ suggestions for service quality improvements, eight categories of improvements were identified. Ranked according to the frequency by which they were mentioned, the top four categories were: (1) broad and specialized assortment, (2) delivery time and flexibility, (3) lower delivery costs and more pricing options, and (4) the user interface and search efficiency. The study contributes relevantly to a better understanding of what the online grocery retailers should prioritize in their service development to meet the changing expectations of a crucially important customer segment, the regular shoppers. Implications for online grocers and limitations of the study are discussed.

One goal, one approach? A comparative analysis of online grocery strategies in France and Germany

With an ever-growing variety of sales formats, food retailers are striving to cover all customers’ needs. This includes setting up online sales, which involve adjustments in companies’ logistics processes. This paper reveals which logistics processes are affected and what effects these changes have on the transport and logistics of groceries.The paper examines the following questions: 1) What are the characteristics of the online grocery market? 2) Which challenges do retailers face in the online market? 3) And what strategies, in particular which logistics and distribution strategies, do they use to meet these challenges and with what success?The research is based on expert interviews combined with in-depth desk research. The paper focuses on the German and French online grocery market, where the forms of supply differ greatly.Applying a systematic research methodology, the paper first describes what types of online grocery services are currently available, mainly distinguishing between home delivery and collection options. The different patterns of storage and picking are compared in terms of their strengths and weaknesses and by assigning them to a modular scheme. The next step examines logistics processes and online sales-related distribution strategies, whereby most challenges are shown to be operational and optimisation is a challenge due to low margins. Consequently, existing location structures are often used, but new ones are also created. A typology of online logistics strategies and distribution organisations is derived with regard to the impact of online sales strategies on the logistics and transport structure. The paper concludes with a discussion of these impacts and an overview of future opportunities.

온라인마트의 유통포장 형태별 소비자 선호 및 영향요인

The online grocery shopping is rapidly growing due to COVID-19, which results in large volumes of delivery packaging waste. Many online supermarkets aware this environmental problem nowadays and deliver goods in recyclable “paper bags/boxes” or reusable “insulated bags” in Korea. However, controversies over both types of delivery packaging in terms of eco-friendliness continue. This study comparatively analyzed consumer preferences for three types of packaging, namely “paper bags/boxes,” “supermarket insulated bags,” and newly suggested “personally owned insulated bags” in this paper and analyzed the factors affecting to them. The data of 218 consumers who regularly buy fresh food online were collected by a survey conducted through a July 2020. By analyzing this data using ANOVA and linear regression analysis, we found that consumer most prefer to receive groceries using suggested “personally owned insulated bags” than the other two types. Also, “perceived importance of temperature maintenance” and “perceived eco-friendliness” had statistically significant effects on preference by packaging type. This result implies that “personally owned insulated bags/coolers” can be the eco-friendly alternative packaging method for online grocery market, thus if online supermarkets add this packaging type, they will be able to improve a green corporate image as well as improve consumer satisfaction.

The Impact of Brand on Consumer Preferences of Milk in Online Purchases: Conjoint Analysis Approach

The aim of the paper is to determine preferences of Czech consumers in online shopping of long-life semi-skimmed milk and to identify the importance of milk attributes in their online buying process, with focus on brand. Specifically, the study is focusing on: 1) identification of the importance of a brand in comparison with packaging, price and quality label in online purchases, 2) finding milk with maximum utility for consumers, and 3) revealing the most preferred brand of milk when other attributes stay the same. Data were collected in September 2018 through an online survey, using full-profile conjoint analysis. A total of 185 respondents 18+ living in the Czech Republic, selected by quota sampling method concerning the role of men and women in household food purchases, completed a questionnaire. Research results reveal that brand is the most important extrinsic quality cue affecting milk choice in online purchases, with relative importance 50.3%. The importance of other surveyed attributes is balanced, with 18.6% for packaging, 17.6% for price and 13.5% for quality label. Comparison of consumer preferences for three different brands of milk with otherwise the same attributes revealed the highest preference for brand coming from the region. A familiar brand plays a key role in maintaining a competitive position in the online grocery market.

Entry Timing in the Face of Switching Costs and its Welfare Effects: Evidence from Same-Day Grocery Delivery Platforms

The online grocery market has seen significant entry over the last five years by firms with different business models. Most firms offer subscriptions, and, in the data, consumers rarely switch between them. I find that switching costs significantly affect consumer platform choice, suggesting potential for future exercise of market power. I estimate the welfare impact of the acquisition of a national grocery chain by of a major online retailer and highlight the role played by this feature of demand and by delivery cost structures. I model competition between two large platforms. The first is the major online retailer engaging in the merger. The rival is an independent platform with low entry costs. The platforms compete in a dynamic entry game, and two opposing forces influence entry timing. I find that firms chase a first-mover advantage resulting from consumer lock-in at the expense of higher entry costs, leading to significant costs of early entry. I estimate that, before the acquisition, the major online retailer had very large entry costs. The acquisition reduced this cost, posing a competitive threat to the rival. Consumer lock-in then contributed to raising the stakes of early entry for both firms, accelerating entry across new markets and generating over \$ 800 M in welfare gains to consumers due to earlier entry. Further, I find that a merger between the two platforms, resulting in a monopoly, would delay entry significantly. These results show that strategic competition in entry timing plays an important role in mergers' welfare effect.

(Dynamic) willingness to pay and e-commerce: Insights from sparkling wine sector in Russia

Although economic theory clearly provides reasons for a hedonic price function to change over time, this is not how it is traditionally approached empirically. For wine, which is one of the most widely used implications of hedonic price analysis, such time invariance can be traced down to the issues of data availability and price rigidity in the food and beverage sector. The development of e-commerce changes both these premises, providing reasons for more frequent price adjustments and making price data available at each point of time. Is willingness to pay for particular product attributes indeed time-invariant? In this paper, daily price quotes from the largest online grocery market in Russia are used to address this question using sparkling wines as an example. The results indicate that time invariance might be a rather strong empirical assumption, suggesting that the time dimension should be included into hedonic price studies whenever the data allows for it.

The Rise, the Fall, and the Resurrection of the Egrocery Channel: A Transformation in Retail Logistics and U.S. Consumer Behavior

Nearly 20 years ago this journal published “Where Have All The On-Line Grocers Gone?” about the growing online grocery market and correctly predicted that the concept would fail until logistics issues were resolved. This article considers the changes that have taken place since then and why there has been a resurrection and exponential growth in the eGrocery channel. It considers how the forced disruption from the COVID-19 virus has served to help further the development and growth of this channel.

Elucidating the Behavior of Consumers toward Online Grocery Shopping: The Role of Shopping Orientation

This research examined the factors affecting consumer buying intention in the online grocery market in Thailand. The conceptual framework incorporates the theories of technology adoption and shopping behavior, including the technology acceptance model, consumer shopping orientation, and online shopping experience. The study was conducted as a quantitative online self-administered survey of Thai consumers who had bought groceries online. The sample was primarily female, younger than 40 years of age, and highly educated. Most participants were infrequent online grocery buyers (once a month or less). The data were analyzed using structural equation modeling. The findings showed that the technology acceptance model variables had the strongest effect on attitude for online shopping, although all hypotheses were accepted. The predictive value of attitude for the online buying intention for groceries was very high. The implication of this research is that online shopping is both a technology decision and a consumer decision and needs to be examined as such.

Collaboration in urban distribution of online grocery orders

Purpose Population growth, urbanisation and the increased use of online shopping are some of the key challenges affecting the traditional logistics model. The purpose of this paper is to focus on the distribution of grocery products ordered online and the subsequent home delivery and click and collect services offered by online retailers to fulfil these orders. These services are unsustainable due to increased operational costs, carbon emissions, traffic and noise. The main objective of the research is to propose sustainable logistics models to reduce economic, environmental and social costs whilst maintaining service levels. Design/methodology/approach The authors have a mixed methodology based on simulation and mathematical modelling to evaluate the proposed shared logistics model using: primary data from a major UK retailer, secondary data from online retailers and primary data from a consumer survey on preferences for receiving groceries purchased online. Integration of these three data sets serves as input to vehicle routing models that reveal the benefits from collaboration by solving individual distribution problems of two retailers first, followed by the joint distribution problem under single decision maker assumption. Findings The benefits from collaboration could be more than 10 per cent in the distance travelled and 16 per cent in the time required to deliver the orders when two online grocery retailers collaborate in distribution activities. Originality/value The collaborative model developed for the online grocery market incentivises retailers to switch from current unsustainable logistics models to the proposed collaborative models.

BigBasket.Com: Redefining the Business Model

BigBasket.com, an online supermarket established in December 2011 in Bangalore, India, had become one of the major players in the Indian online grocery market by the end of March 2016.1 Run by Innovative Retail Concepts Private Limited, BigBasket.com was operating in more than 23 cities across the country in 2016. The online grocery market in India was in a stage of growth and transformation, fuelled by India's large urban population who sought a lifestyle of convenience and ease. It had also attracted many entrepreneurs who competed fiercely with each other in a market characterised by thin margins. Intense competition ensured that only a few companies were able to survive and sustain themselves. One of these companies was Big Basket, which succeeded in spite of the competition, attracting Series Da funding worth USD 150b million from the United Arab Emirates-based Abraaj Group in March 2016.2

A New Process Model for Urban Transport of Food in the UK

Abstract: Urbanisation is increasing at a rapid pace and one of the consequences of this trend is that more people live in cities, more people demand more products, and above all, more food needs to be transported to and distributed within the cities. With the advancement of new technologies and widespread use of mobile devices in the population, more and more people prefer to shop online, not just books, electronics, or fashion products, but food products as well, in particular the groceries. In this work, we focus on this growing challenge of food distribution in the cities, from the viewpoint of this emerging channel: home deliveries of online food purchases. Especially in the UK which is the second biggest online grocery market over the world, retailers are offering online shopping to their customers and then fulfil the home delivery using their own fleet. This poses challenges to retailers in terms of increased costs from providing a non-core service of distribution and logistics to end-consumers and the life in the cities in general in terms of increased carbon emissions and traffic. We design models that propose appropriate incentives to retailers to collaborate for the distribution of home deliveries. For this purpose, we initially investigate the current market structure and operations. Then, we test our logistics sharing models with empirical data from a retailer based in London to show the relevance of collaboration. Our results suggest that it is theoretically possible to collaborate and reduce economic, environmental, and social costs arising from the uncoordinated case; however, implementation of these ideas still pose a great challenge due to the extremely competitive nature of the food retail market.

Off-line점포 유통업체의 온라인몰 전용센터 물류시스템 구축사례 연구 ; 유통업체 A사 사례 중심으로

Abstract Recently, online grocery shopping has been increasing with the development of internet, mobile, and IT technology due to the proportion of consumers changes like increasing single households and double-income couples. Therefore, online sales from distributors with offline stores have also increased, and the offline retailers are facing their limits in dealing with store-based online channel they have carried out. Domestic offline retailers benchmarked overseas advanced retailers to solve this problem by reviewing about developing the online-only distribution center. However, much investment is needed in order to operate the distribution center with the new concept from abroad. In this study, we have reviewed the current online grocery market trend and the theory related to developing distr ibution system of the online mall. For offline retailers, we have reviewed the case which developed the distribution center applied to the nation’s first online-only distribution center. The purpose of this study is reducing trial and error for local retailers in developing online-only distribution centers and suggesting ways to improve investment effect.Keywords : Retailer, Online Mall, Logistics Information System, System Implementation