We’ve all visited the grocery store for “a few things,” only to leave with a shopping cart filled with things we absolutely don’t need. If that happens to you, don’t feel bad. Grocery stores invest a lot of time and effort to trick customers into buying more.
Whether it’s where they place the product in the market or which colors they feature for sales, supermarkets carefully calculate every item on the shelf. Read on to learn the calculated tactics that grocery stores use to make people spend more so that you can outsmart them next time.
Shopping Carts Keep Getting Bigger To Fit More Food
Today, grocery store shopping carts are three times larger than they were in 1975. An experiment in 2011 demonstrated that when costumers use a bigger shopping cart, they buy up to 40% more products.
Shopping carts oddly benefit consumers as well. The Journal of Marketing Research claims that people who shop with baskets are more likely to buy “vice products,” or unhealthy, wasteful items. They hypothesize that bending your arm to carry the basket places strain that prompts impulsive spending.
