Store Loyalty?

Living in Norridge, I shop at Aldi, Butera and Produce World. At times when a good deal presents itself, I will visit Jewel or Dominicks. What I am amazed at is some people do their ENTIRE shopping at Jewel and Dominicks! EEgad, it is my Mom! I see some people paying 89/lb for bananas while I might pay 39 cents at Produce World, forget everything else. My mother prefers "brand name" stores, even if feta cheese is $7.99/lb (domestic feta at Produce World, last time I purchased, $2.99/lb.). We can only buy "Green Giant" cans, perish the thought of fresh or frozen! Auugh! tires me out. Anyone else experience the "brand" store experience with the parents?

I know about this type of behavior, but if she's not buying your food and it makes her happy, why does it matter to you?

My main concern when it comes to grocery shopping is proximity. If I need "normal" stuff, I go to the Jewel near our apartment. If need something pre-prepared, snacky, or "mid-range gourmet", I'll stop at the Trader Joe's that I pass on the way home from work. If I need some better-than-normal produce, I'll stop at the Whole Foods that I pass on the way home from work. In the rare case when I need something "high-end gourmet", I'll go a bit out of my way to stop at Fox & Obel on the way home from work.

Only if I need something totally out of the ordinary, very specific, hard-to-find ethnic, or bulk will I get in the car & go out of my way (Costco, Paulina Meat Market, Patel Brothers, Marketplace on Oakton, etc.).

The way I see it, driving from where I live (near Clark & Division) to, well, just about anywhere takes 30 minutes or more each way, plus a gallon or two of gas...to me, I just can't justify the extra time & expense to save a few bucks. Every "a few bucks" certainly adds up into a not-insignificant amount of money, I'm sure, but whaddaya gonna do.

Hi,

When my Mom was an active grocery shopper, she read the ads to plan her cherry picking. She pretty much bought the loss leaders at several stores displaying no particular loyalty beyond the next best deal.

Now on the rare occasion she does any grocery shopping, Sunset Foods in Highland Park is preferred. It is a compact store with people who unpack your cart at the cashier, who load your car and are quick to get you out of the store. Yet she reads the Jewel ads, then offers her suggestions of what I can buy. I will do her cherry picking, then go to Garden Fresh for most everything else.

Mom2 is also a Sunset Foods in Libertyville shopper largely due to the extra assistance. Otherwise she goes to Garden Fresh, too.

Regards,

My mother, who didn't work, had all the time in the world to shop. I have a limited window and choose to use it efficiently. Everybody makes their own lifestyle choices.

Khaopaat wrote:My main concern when it comes to grocery shopping is proximity. If I need "normal" stuff, I go to the Jewel near our apartment. If need something pre-prepared, snacky, or "mid-range gourmet", I'll stop at the Trader Joe's that I pass on the way home from work. If I need some better-than-normal produce, I'll stop at the Whole Foods that I pass on the way home from work. In the rare case when I need something "high-end gourmet", I'll go a bit out of my way to stop at Fox & Obel on the way home from work.

Only if I need something totally out of the ordinary, very specific, hard-to-find ethnic, or bulk will I get in the car & go out of my way (Costco, Paulina Meat Market, Patel Brothers, Marketplace on Oakton, etc.).

The way I see it, driving from where I live (near Clark & Division) to, well, just about anywhere takes 30 minutes or more each way, plus a gallon or two of gas...to me, I just can't justify the extra time & expense to save a few bucks. Every "a few bucks" certainly adds up into a not-insignificant amount of money, I'm sure, but whaddaya gonna do.

I'm with you...my time is way more important so I don't sweat driving all over to save a few bucks. If the store happens to be on the way home from work, I will stop in, but as a rule of thumb I shop where it is quick and easy.

It comes down to individual values, yes? Some of it is generational - my guess is that many more people stayed at the same job, ordered the same donut each morning, and never strayed from Aunt Jemima or Sears. Those of us who are younger are going to have varying degrees of loyalty, but because of how the world is and was when we grew up, it's probably not got the same importance. Personality is certainly some of it, too. Me? Brand loyalty is much less important than many other things.

Someone early on in the thread asked why it mattered. The same reason that someone doing something differently than we do freaks us out at times. When someone does something and it's not like we do (or think), we notice. Probably related to evolution and our survival. We need to notice people acting different. And, almost all of us have a hard time accepting values that are quite different from our own. Our best friends and lasting mates usually have values similar in many respects - we keep the same amount of clean, think about work, saving, sex, religion, etc. very similary. The more different we are, the more we fight. The more different, the harder to "let go" and let them be/think/act in ways they value and we don't.

When it's our mom or dad?????? That's even worse! For me, it's my MIL. She does things that are soooooo antithetical to me that I just shake my head in awe. Our worldview is about 180.

My shopping values are an equal match between quality, ease in purchasing, item interest, good farming practices and cost. My MIL values cost and brand, with item interest only coming into play when cost and brand align. If she loves it and it's expensive, too bad, so sad, she'd not getting it. I might buy early season cherries at $5 a pound because they are delicious and the season is short and I LOVE them, if they at a store close to me and look and smell delicious. But I'd probably go to $6 if they were raised organic. She'd never buy them because they cost more the $2 a pound, her cut off point for fruit. She thinks I'm crazy for buying any of my food at Whole Foods. For me, it's across the street (easy to get to), has things that are both high quality and interest me, and for many items (the 365 brands, for example) are less than Jewel or Dominicks. She goes with me sometimes and looks, but never buys anything! She often holds up some produce and tells me how much she'd pay for it the produce store on Cicero she loves. It's a fine store, but I'd lose more in the trip to get there (I don't have a car) than I'd save. In the time it would take me to get there and back, I could have worked and billed 2-3 hours to a client. She's retired, so that bus trip isn't a hassle and is even fun for her.

I just have to remember that her perspective is equally valid to mine and mine isn't right...it's just right for me. (Even though I'm sure mine must be better in some way ).

store loyalty, no.

I shop for convenience & price for some items, and quality for others.

I buy alot of my meat from a local butcher, most of my produce at a local mexican market, or farmstands,, my seafood from a seafood specialty shop, and my canned goods, and other items from gasp... Super Wal-Mart...

There are stores I try to avoid like Jewel and Dominicks, and there are stores I avoid alltogether like Whole Foods, and Trader Joes.

Cathy2, I shop pretty much exactly the way your Mom, Mom2, and you do.

diane ck wrote:Living in Norridge, I shop at Aldi, Butera and Produce World. At times when a good deal presents itself, I will visit Jewel or Dominicks. What I am amazed at is some people do their ENTIRE shopping at Jewel and Dominicks! EEgad, it is my Mom! I see some people paying 89/lb for bananas while I might pay 39 cents at Produce World, forget everything else. My mother prefers "brand name" stores, even if feta cheese is $7.99/lb (domestic feta at Produce World, last time I purchased, $2.99/lb.). We can only buy "Green Giant" cans, perish the thought of fresh or frozen! Auugh! tires me out. Anyone else experience the "brand" store experience with the parents?

A few years ago, I was paid to do market research for a leading baked good firm. It required me to do a five minute interview with 40 consumers ... in the middle of the Jewel bakery aisle.

After close to 200 interviews on bread buying habits, I can honestly say that for MOST people, convenience is preobably the LEADING reason for selecting a particular store. Jewel gets the largest number of customers due to familiarity and proximity to home. And that is despite the fact that I did not interview a lot of the mothers dragging around 2-3 kids or the like.

Personally, I shop around looking for the best deals. Deals are defined as the best quality and quantity for the best price. I will shop at Jewel and Dominick's when they have the best deals available. But then, I enjoy running through markets. On occasion, this has attracted a lot of attention. I had a Kroger's manager follow me around the store for a solid 35 minutes.

convience
quality
value

loyality would fit in with customer service
if you know your store has good consistant fresh produce and meat
if you really enjoy and can afford their prepared foods


overall
i look at prices from
jewel dominicks sams costco restrauant depot trader joes and aldi as well as the independent grocery stores caputos
superlow and edmar meijer is great but not close and too big for a lot of my needs

whatever stores you shop at
all stores have sales most all items are put on sale
there are different sales cycles and depth of deals
learn the sales patterns and shop accordingly
if you are after the best quality and best value

Re price, I'd be curious (and I mean truly curious, with no agenda one way or the other) to know what the typical savings, per person, would be over the course of a year, between a person who bought everything at the Jewel because it was convenient, and the person who always traveled in search of the best price. Not factoring in cost of gas, "cost of time," etc., just plain dollar savings on groceries--would it be, for instance, a grand total of $100 a year? Would it be, on the other hand, $10,000 a year? I have no idea.

Granted that people's preferences differ--one person may buy only choice beef, the other only prime, etc.--shopping list being equal, what would you say the average price-driven consumer saves over the course of a year by not just buying everything at the Jewel? If you are that price-driven consumer, what do you save over the course of a year?

Riddlemay, I watch that pretty carefully- not counting loss leaders, individual items can be between fifty cents and a dollar less at local grocers than at somewhere like the Jewel.

I used to shop at either Jewel or Dominick's almost exclusively. Now that I'm unemployed, I'm more motivated to save money and have more time on my hands, so I've been branching out.

I find that I now "need" to go to four or more places for specific things. I buy almost all our meat at Costco now, and have added Peoria Packing to the rotation as well. For produce I go to Lincolnwood Produce, which also carries a pretty nice selection of meats, cheeses, and dairy, and their deli case and bread section are wonderful. Prices there are fabulous and their produce section puts that of Jewel to shame.

Unfortunately, I still go to Jewel/Dominick's for specific items that the other stores don't carry, so that's part of the trip as well.

I waste a lot of gas, probably, but my $85 at Lincolnwood would easily be $135 at Jewel, so I feel like it's well worth it. Costco's usually about $200 every couple weeks, but I stock up on stuff and break it into smaller packs and freeze it when I get home. Plus, their meat is way better quality than I would get elsewhere. The savings on stuff like nuts and cheese at Costco vs. Jewel/D's blows my mind. Can't believe how much those places charge for good cheese.

The downside is that the whole trip (if I do everything at once) takes three or four hours. But I tend to break it up into two trips.

I've brought this up before...

A couple years ago, the Wall Streett Journal did a nationwide survey of grocery stores that issued "loyalty cards" - a la Jewel and Dominicks - and similar-sized stores that did not. They surveyed Dominick's and Cub, in Chicago. There were about five other similar studies in major cities across the country.

They made up a standard family shopping list and bought - or at least priced - it in all the stores in the survey.

They found that, in EVERY loyalty-card store, in EVERY city, that if you were convinced to do most of your grocery shopping there, you paid MORE for your groceris overall than in the non-card store, despite the various "bargains" that your card entitled you to get.

This did not enhance my opinion of either Jewel or Dominick's, and they are my last choice as shopping alternatives.

Mike

The cards are, in short, sucker-bait.

If the savings reported by Mhays in the other thread and elakin on this one are the savings on a week's worth of groceries, then the average $40 saved works out to around $2100 a year, or not chickenfeed.

I'd say $40 a week would be about right...except that I still do shop at the big stores for specific items, and often buy what I need while I'm there for convenience's sake. So it probably works out about half that in savings, still not chicken feed and certainly more savings than gas. Not to mention that the quality is better in the smaller stores.

I try to do a round-robin: one week I do a lot of produce shopping at a smaller or Asian store, heavy on things that keep like apples, potatoes, etc. and on ethnic staples like olive oil or chickpeas and also buy fish, chicken, and regular groceries (I rarely buy beef or pork, we do that in bulk and freeze.) The next week when we've run out of milk, I go to the Jewel and pick up loss-leader stuff like sodas and maybe cleaning supplies (sometimes I do this at Target if we're good for produce, but it doesn't wind up being any cheaper because there's always other nonfood things we wind up buying.) The next week I'll go to the Aldi and stock up on cereal and dairy products, stopping by Marketplace on Oakton to fill in on produce.

This rotation is easier in the summer, when I'm growing parsley and lemon basil (which I sub for cilantro) and greens like swiss chard and lettuce - especially since the farmer's markets are open.

Love to eat, but I only enjoy shopping if it is pretty. So, I can make a trip on CTA, one train and one bus to go to the Green City Market, but driving or walking 2 blocks away to the Dominick's is a nevermind. Do I really have to get fill in the blank now or can it wait? If it can wait I will not go to the store closest to me.

Since I prefer my shopping pretty and we live on produce, it becomes a fight for The Stanley's, Trader Joe's, Whole Food rotation. This is actually pretty funny because you will see other people doing the same thing. The problem with this is since the recession became news du jour, Stanley's has become a living nightmare to get in and out of at normal shopping times ( Sunday afternoon anyone) for 9-5 workers. I go to Costco when I run out of paper towels, paper, or toilet tissue ( once every 8-12 weeks I think). Then I stock up on Coke Zero and/or Pellegrino Water. I go to F & O to contemplate getting the fabulous apple pie, and then stuff like Coke Zero, Miss Fran's shortbread, and Meyer Lemons ( a necessity for the coke zero served over ice).

The produce at my local Dominick's and Jewel tend not to be pretty. It also tends to be as expensive, if not more so, IMHO (assuming not a loss leader sale) than Stanley's or Whole Foods for similar produce.

Problem solved last week, back to Irv and Shelly's Fresh Choice delivery for produce and dairy. The rest can always wait if we have fresh fruit and vegetables for a garbage salad.

The reason my mother's "brand" shopping had bothered me is I know she can save more overall shopping at other stores in our area. With her being on the limited budget, I would love to see her be able to buy more for her buck. It is not about convenience in our area, as Butera & Produce World are closer to our house than Jewel or Dominicks. Sadly, I have had to transition her into a nursing home. Any shopping at this time is out for now. I would do anything now just to be able to "brand" shop with her once again and keep my mouth shut.

That kind of shortsightedness appears in other ways, too - for instance, my Dad, who is perpetually on a diet, eats a Hostess Suzy-Q every day, but is absolutely resistant to the idea that he might be able to have a treat that tastes better - say, a chocolate bar, or might lose some weight if he just cut out a couple of them a week.

Sometimes familiarity and predictability trumps other values.

I agree that the cards are sucker-bait. I think I've been in Dominicks once in the past 3 years or so. The rare times we go to Jewel, it's just to buy the really good deal sale or buy 1 get 1 free items, and use our ANONYMOUS Albertsons card we brought back from a west coast trip. All too often I look at a B1G1F item, and say "still cheaper at Woodmans".

I can't remember where I found the survey of major Chicago area grocery options. They used Jewel as the baseline. IIRC Dominicks and Sunset were a penny or two higher, and only a few specialty shops significantly higher. Virtually every other grocery store option was cheaper. The SECOND cheapest was WalMart. Woodmans even beats Walmart for prices.

If I can find the site, I'll post a link here. [Update: the link was http://www.checkbook.org/cbs2/supermarket/ but that was a trial free access that is no longer valid. Looks like you need to subscribe to access their list]

Years ago we had a family Sams club membership, but dropped that when they raised their prices, and we were both working full time so we weren't able to make a 15 mile trip regularly. Last weekend they offered one of their guest cards with NO non member surcharge, so we checked them out again. It certainly cured our desire to go back. We had a whole list of "favorites" we remembered, none of which they carried any more. And the prices were anything but bargains compared to what we usually pay for stuff. We used to leave the place with a full cart, this time it would have all fit in one of the quick trip baskets. We bought exactly EIGHT items.

On the way out, my wife commented on how much more expensive they used to be than when we shopped there regularly. I pointed out to her that back then, we were the buy everything at Jewel family, and we now shop at Woodmans, giving us a 35% lower baseline for comparing things to. I don't know how a small independent chain can beat Walmart at their own game, but I'm very happy to have them almost around the corner from us.

Many people do not have time to chase around to different stores to save a few bucks. I could probably go to a few different stores to find things cheaper but I don't. I only have limited time to shop and I get what I need at the store I go to. I do alternate between stores from time to time visiting Jewel, Dominicks, Trader Joe's, Ultra, and Whole Foods but I do not go to all or many of these in one week. Do not have time.

My mom who has trouble walking goes only to Jewel. She can't be chasing around to other stores because she has a walker. She's just lucky to be able to get food, period.

On the other hand, my grandfather (RIP) when he was retired would often travel from store to store to save a quarter here and there on something. We used to kind of laugh at him for doing it. He probably wasted more gas going from store to store trying to save a quarter. But he was able to walk and he had the time.

toria wrote:On the other hand, my grandfather (RIP) when he was retired would often travel from store to store to save a quarter here and there on something. We used to kind of laugh at him for doing it. He probably wasted more gas going from store to store trying to save a quarter. But he was able to walk and he had the time.

Back then a quarter was still worth something

Like over a gallon of gas