An empirical test of experiential shopping in food retailing

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether the influence of shopping experience on consumer satisfaction shown in non-food retail sectors has a similar effect in food retailing, specifically with large-scale grocery retailers. The paper also investigates differences in shopping experience and its effect across different retail settings. Design/methodology/approach - An empirical study of a customer satisfaction database combining satisfaction with store attributes across several large-scale grocery retailers in the specialty, traditional, and discount sectors. Hierarchal regression is used to meaure the effect of a composite shopping experience index on overall satisfaction, after controlling for basic economic factors of food shopping such as product quality, assortment, availability, and prices. Findings - There was support for three hypotheses, suggesting that: food shopping experience effects overall consumer satisfaction for grocery retailers; shopping experience varies across different grocery retail settings; and the effect of food shopping experience on consumer satisfaction varies across grocery retail settings. Research limitations/implications - Data report a single point in time and aggregate measures. Guidance is provided for food retailers wanting to further develop shopping experience to impact consumer satisfaction. Originality/value - The paper gives important empirical support for the influence of shopping experience on customer satisfaction for large-scale grocery retailers and across various retail settings.