Did You Know-How Grocery Stores Upsell
1. Listing the Sale Price for Multiple Items
You’ve probably seen a sale tag that advertises multiple items at a certain price, like two cans of soup for $6.00, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to buy two to get the deal. Take a closer look, because chances are those cans are actually $3.00 each. It’s worth looking carefully at the tag, just in case you do actually have to buy multiple things, but most of the time it’s just a technique to upsell you.
2. Displaying Items From Different Aisles Together
Chocolate syrup isn’t frozen, so why do you sometimes find it near ice cream? It’s the same reason you might find marshmallows next to graham crackers, whipped cream in the produce aisle, or red pepper flakes near frozen pizza: to get you to go in for one thing and leave with two. You were perfectly happy to just buy cheese when you walked in the store, you don’t need fancy crackers, too.
3. Displaying Full-Price Items Like They’re on Sale
The short sides of the aisle are called end caps, and they’re often the source of deals. Sometimes the producer negotiates a low price with the store for visibility, and other times, especially in the back, it’s where discontinued or clearance items go. But new or seasonal products sometimes end up in flashy end-cap displays, too — at full price, occasionally with the bonus upsell of pairing up two items from different aisles that go together.
4. Stocking Essentials in the Back
One thing you might notice about shopping at a grocery store is that staples like eggs, cheese, and bread are rarely placed toward the front entrance making you walk through a labyrinth of potential impulse purchases (and other sales techniques) on your way to your essentials. That makes it hard for even the most diligent list makers to stay immune from heavy merchandising. Keep this in mind on your long journey to the back, especially if you can’t afford to buy extra snacks.
5. Stocking Expensive Items at Eye Level
Ever notice that store brands tend to be lower on the shelves than name brands? This makes the more expensive items easier to spot and more likely to end up in a shopping cart. There’s a very common exception to this rule. More expensive children’s cereals tend to be a little lower down, at eye level with smaller shoppers. Some are even designed so that the cartoon characters on the boxes are looking directly at the kids.
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6. Free Samples
This one may seem obvious. Of course you’ll want to buy an item you try first if it’s delicious and that’s a big part of it. Sales of an item can go up as much as 2,000% if customers get to sample it, partially because they know what they’re getting, but partially because they feel bad for getting something for free. Yet the psychology goes deeper than just the product itself. After sampling something good, customers may be more likely to buy other things that they like throughout the store, not just the sampled product. In other words, while free samples can be great, just make sure to check your instincts after filling up on tiny bites.
Source: http://www.HistoryFacts.com
Images: http://www.Photoroom.com
http://www.InDianesKitchen.com
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Categories: Did You Know
Great read 👍🏼🤓
Thank you Randy!
You’re welcome
Fascinating
Thank you Derrick!
Thanks so much Ned!
My dad taught me a long time ago to never shop in the middle of the store it’s all junk LOL! The edge has all you need, veggies, fruit, meats, dairy, bakery and dry goods. He is right and I have kept to that to this today (mostly). 🙂
I remember hearing that too, what great words to shop by. Your dad is a smart man!
Display and merchandising in a store is an art form and I love how you’ve highlighted the different ways stores get you to spend more during each visit. Putting milk, bread and eggs at opposite parts of the store is another technique they use to get you to explore the entire space and to buy more!
Yes and it really annoys me when we shop at Sam’s Club. We only shop about once a month and every time we go they move things all around so we have to look for what we want.
That’s how they get you to keep buying! 🤣 I swear even the carts get incrementally bigger each time.
All good advice Goddess and also pretty sharp eyes you have. Beware of the shelf talkers. Those little signs that promote phony sale items. Hope you had a great Thanksgiving. Best to you and yours.
Thank you JC. We had a wonderful non-stressful day with delicious food! I hope you enjoyed family and good food too.
I am so watchful when grocery shopping now, I never used to be but with the prices the way they are, I really check for deals and only TRY to get what we need lol
I understand that! I still plan on the same budget as I did for years. We save a lot of money by buying a side of beef. We picked it up about two months ago and then my husband had to have 4 stents put in to his heart. He has given up red meat so I will have to have family for dinner a lot! Lol
Oh, I’m sorry to hear about your husband‘s health, hopefully he is doing great now. 😊Yeah we don’t eat a lot of red meat either. But we do eat a lot of vegetables and they are getting pretty expensive.
Why is it the healthy food costs more than the unhealthy food? Just like sugar free, if they left the sugar out then it should cost less right? 🤣
Yes, one would think that, but I think they want us to buy the processed foods for some reason🤔
That’s terrible and most shoppers don’t take the time to check these things out, so “buyer beware!” as the saying goes. I do resent how the stores push their store brand out front, to the extent you can’t find the name brands anymore. There are a lot of items that I will buy the store brand, but some I don’t, so this is not to my liking at all. My favorite is how the price is the same, the bottle/container/package is smaller, especially if you still have some of the old one left to compare. And it gets me to see “contents may settle” … MAY settle?! I only use instant coffee and I once went to open a bottle of instant coffee and at least 1 1/2 inches was missing from the top. I knew that I broke the seal so someone was not tampering with the bottle/seal and took some out, etc.
I know! I hate that sugar is no longer in 5# bags, it’s in 4# now. All the recipes get changed because of the decrease in size, unless you want to buy 2 items and have to throw some out.
And the different size for cake mixes too – that was the first time I had about the re-sizing/re-packaging trend. It used to be the only inconsistency was that you got more hot dog rolls in a package than you got wieners in a package … so you had hot dog rolls for your lunch – not all bad as we did that because waste not, want not.
I always end up throwing away the extra or Terry ate them but not anymore.
No, you’re right about that.
Good things to know. At my age, I am aware of pretty much all of these “tricks,” but it never hurts to have a refresher.
Haha I can relate to the “at my age” comment. I guess what they say is true, with age comes wisdom.
No one can deny it; stores know how to convince consumers to buy products they don’t really need! One of my main mottos before I go shopping is to make sure I have eaten and I’m not hungry – this has saved me many times from buying items that aren’t on my list 😏.
I could never stick to any of it as my husband LOVES grocery shopping and I hate it. It took me a long time to get him to look at the expiration dates and get the one that will last longer, not in 2 days. Then to get him to buy my favorite name brand products was another nightmare. He would say he bought it because it was cheaper. Lol
Haha 😁, just proving once again: All men are the same … because mine does exactly the same!!
That’s so funny!
I remember a couple of years ago I didn’t have to buy the amount they list to get the sale price! I was fooled by the 2 for, for so long! I was so happy when I figured out could just buy one. 🙂
Enjoyed this post!
They have some sneaky marketing tricks! Thank you Tierney.