One-fifth of the UK’s online shoppers visit supermarket websites each month, with an average of 1.3 million people purchasing groceries online in the same period, according to Kantar Media Compete’s Online Shopper Intelligence Report.
Convenience is a key motivation for consumers to bypass the supermarket in favour of online grocery shopping, the report revealed; shoppers like having the ability to do their shopping at any time (60 per cent), having products delivered (58 per cent), and not having to carrying home heavy bags of groceries (55 per cent).
The research highlighted an average of 57 per cent of Internet grocery shoppers visit their list of favourite items or the last products purchased before completing the transaction.
With more supermarkets now going online to grow market share, shoppers are also able to compare prices across websites easily; the online competitor price monitoring also helps consumers to save on travel costs by not having to go from store to store to compare prices.
Over half (57 per cent) of the people purchasing groceries online do their shopping at Tesco; this is followed by Asda (33 per cent), Sainsbury’s (18 per cent), Ocado (5 per cent), Amazon grocery (4 per cent), Waitrose (2 per cent) and Marks & Spencer (1 per cent).
The Online Shopper Intelligence Report also revealed how ‘heavy shoppers’ buy 62 per cent of their groceries online with an average basket value of £144 while ‘light shoppers’ buy 28 per cent of their groceries on the web and spend £82 on average per online shop. Meanwhile, sixty nine per cent of heavy shoppers use a range of grocery retailers, compared to 17 per cent of light shoppers.
However, ‘heavy shoppers’ represent only 3 per cent of online grocery shoppers. “Online grocery retailers would do well to focus efforts on capturing a greater share of monthly purchases among both the heavy and medium shopper segments,” stated the report.
Online shopping means that shoppers are able to shop at a time that suits them, said Jeremy Radcliffe, managing director of Kantar Media Compete. He explained that shoppers are increasingly mixing the channels. “However, as many as one-third indicate that 60 per cent or more of their grocery purchases are made online”.
The full report is available for download from the Kantar Media Compete website here: http://www.kantarmedia.compete.com/news.html.
© 2012 Profitero
About Profitero
Pricing intelligence company Profitero works with retailers and manufacturers to help them increase sales and maximise their profits by using competitor price, promotions and stock information at scale. For more information on Profitero price intelligence and competitor monitoring, visit www.profitero.com or email sales@profitero.com.
