Tuesday, March 24, 2015

Paper or plastic: checking out consumption influences at Trader Joe's


The 3rd and Final Voyage

Grocery Shopping: an acquisitional or experiential activity? 


Grocery shopping would typically be considered an activity that requires acquisitional shopping, or activities that are oriented toward a specific, intended purchase (Babin/Harris 2014). Grocery stores are usually filled with busy parents with a list of items they need and try to get in and out of the store in as short of time as possible. However, Trader Joe’s plays on many affective qualities rather than just functional qualities a grocery store is expected to make up their retail personality.

External influences of Trader Joe's


Physical Surroundings: External influences related to Trader Joe’s include the physical surroundings, or atmospherics and retail personality. Affective qualities relevant to Trader Joe’s include friendly employees, bright lighting, the vibrant colors, and the store design and layout. These are the qualities that represent emotional meaning to the shopping environment and result from the sum effect of all ambient attributes that affect the way the shoppers feel about the store (Babin/Harris 2014). Trader Joe’s emphasizes affective qualities and gives up some functional qualities such as a wide selection. Compared to the 30,000 products a traditional grocer offers, Trader Joe’s only stocks 2,000 items (Bloomberg). However, Trader Joe’s is well known for their functional quality of guarantee. They have a return policy that you are able to be fully refunded or exchange any item for any reason without questions asked. It could be as simple as you don’t like the product.

Examples of the vibrant colors and external influences that make the shopping experience experiential and draw attention of consumers to certain products

Social Surroundings: Social surroundings do not tend to play as significant of a role when I am grocery shopping because I prefer to shop alone. Social surroundings including those who are present during decision making and can present peer pressure that affects our purchases tends to be minimized when I go grocer shopping since I try as often as possible to go alone (Babin/Harris 2014). An exception to this would be the social surroundings of the employees working at Trader Joe’s. Since they are so knowledgeable about the products, whenever I ask for a recommendation, I end up feeling peer pressure to make a purchase of the product they recommended even if I was just asking for a recommendation for future reference.

My Guilty Pleasure: Impulsive Consumption at Trader Joe's 

One thing I have noticed when shopping at Trader Joe’s is my impulsive consumption of the Cookie Butter candy bar (Can you blame me?! If you haven’t tried it yet I highly recommend this bar of pure deliciousness). The act can be classified as impulsive because it is spontaneous and involves a short-term feeling of liberation (or in this case satisfying my sweet tooth), diminished regard for any cost or consequences associated with the act (similar to the Starbucks study discussed in class about annual spending adding up, I justify that it is only $0.99 and also ignore consequences of the additional calories I’m consuming), and also being motivated by a need for immediate self-fulfillment and are highly involving emotionally and associated with hedonic shopping value (as mentioned in my previous blogs I place more hedonic value of the fun, exciting experience of grocery shopping and would be classified as a more highly involved shopper) (Babin/Harris 2014). Trader Joe's, like many other grocery stores, understands that point-of-purchase displays are an easy way to attract impulse purchases and it is no surprise that these candy bars are located right at the checkout lanes for susceptible shoppers like myself. Over time though, I have found this impulsive consumption behavior turn into a re-occurring purchase, and therefore it may be shifting from an impulsive buy to a habit.
An example of my impulsive consumption at Trader Joe's


 Well that wraps up my third and final blog for MKT313! I hope you all have enjoyed learning about the shopping experience of Trader Joe's and these blogs have encouraged you to see what all the hype is about for yourself! If the cookie butter chocolate bars aren't enough to convince you, then I don't know what is...

Sources: 
Trader Joe's Recipe for Success
Babin/Harris (2014) Consumer Behavior

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