The confinement has changed the buying habits of the French. For fear of being contaminated, many of them went to local food shops. But the promises to bring city centers and independent businesses to life come up against the fact that the vast majority of customers seem to have forgotten their good resolutions as soon as deconfinement is implemented. A few ways to understand this phenomenon.
Will the French stick to their good local consumption resolutions? Not really to listen to the first concerned, the small businesses. Journalists from France 3 Bourgogne-Franche-Comté report the disappointment of city center grocers. “The disappointment! The black hole apart from a few regulars. The day after May 11, I made 100 euros during the day. I started to rework a little last week with correct days compared to my forecast“, laments Christophe Follot manager of a grocery store in Varois-et-Chaignot (Côte-dOr). Same bitterness for Laurent Pouillard manager of a supermarket in Marizy (Saône-et-Loire) also questioned by public regional television. “During the confinement, we were thanked. We were told ‘luckily you’re here’! Then people quickly resumed their habits, they shop in supermarkets near their work“, he explains.
A backlash all the more painful as the situation of confinement favored them. Local food businesses benefited from a real rush in their stores between mid-March and until the start of deconfinement. + 2.5% food market share, i.e. 8.8%. A good score for these merchants who were emerging after a few years in a very competitive environment. However, it was not so much their attractiveness as the fear of large surfaces that motivated these new customers. The containment has been a “Blast” for the large food distribution sector analyze the LSA journalists. According to Kantar figures between March 23 and April 19, this sector lost 3.1 million customers, or 8.1 points of market share. At the same time, customers seem to have shifted to drive-thru, e-commerce (10% market share each), discounters (9%) and convenience stores (8.8%).”Containment requires, here are indeed our neighborhood convenience stores with average baskets up 46%, worthy of a supermarket and a network, Carrefour Proximité, which gained 1.3 points of market share over the period (3.4% ), i.e. 40% of its total market share all of a sudden…” writing the LSA in early May.
Back to shopping centers
However, the deconfinement has started a return to ante-confinement habits. According to a survey conducted by Quantaflow for the National Council of Shopping Centers, the latter recovered 71% of their attendance at the end of May compared to the same week of May 2019. A desire for large areas more marked in the provinces (75%) than in in Ile-de-France (56%). A growing phenomenon since a week later – i.e. a month after the start of deconfinement – this index stands at 79% compared to the same period as last year. Figures that make the National Council of Shopping Centers optimistic. “Under these conditions and if this trend is confirmed, we can hope for a return to activity levels close to those of 2019 for the start of the school year.” says Gontran Thüring, General Delegate.
How to explain such a turnaround? According to a survey carried out by Kantar, households who claim to frequent local shops less at the end of confinement justify their choice 52% by ‘prices too high compared to other stores’, 37% by ‘lack of choice’ and 33% by ‘fear that social distancing will not be respected’.
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