Every July, NACS Convenience Voices begins surveying convenience store customers nationwide. By the end of the summer, NACS collects over 10,000 surveys.
Customers are surveyed using a geofenced mobile intercept system that captures customer feedback right as customers make those crucial in-store decisions, or during what Leroy Kelsey, research director at NACS and director of Convenience Voices, refers to as the “retail moment of truth.”
For Kelsey, the summer is the most exciting part of the year. “We work with both suppliers and retailers to create personalized Convenience Voices surveys,” said Kelsey. Once survey fielding is complete and preliminary data is finalized, Kelsey starts to share the findings, noting that “no two companies are the same, and therefore no two presentations are the same.”
What is Convenience Voices focusing on in 2024?
- Site attributes that win occasions
- Meal occasion drivers from the shopper’s view
- Increasing sales in a down economy
Convenience Voices participants choose several of their own questions—and for many, the outlook for this holiday season is top of mind. Travel during the holiday season is second only to summer road trip season, and so it’s a critical time for convenience stores to capture customers.
While Convenience Voices doesn’t yet have a crystal ball, survey answers reveal what retailers need to know about holiday travel and the overall prognosis for the remainder of the year.
According to data gathered between July and September, over the next six months, 36.1% of people plan to visit convenience stores more often than they currently do, while 66.4% of shoppers plan to travel over the holidays (October through January), with one in three planning to travel in December.
The Regional Breakdown
The Northeast, NACS Region 1, saw the biggest increase in shoppers planning to travel with a year-over-year growth of 4.4 points. Those in the Northeast seem to be eyeing trips to warmer climates during the peak holiday travel season, and 33.2% said they planned to visit convenience stores more often in the next six months.
Responses indicated that residents of the Southeast, Region 2, will be traveling less (by -3.3 pts) this holiday season, but that doesn’t mean retailers won’t see them in stores; 39.90% of Southeastern respondents shared they plan to visit convenience stores more often than they currently do.
Your customer lives in a world of choice. Convenience Voices surveys are designed to capture customer experiences, develop a deeper understanding of customers’ motivations and choices and activate shopper behavior against data. Contact Leroy Kelsey at [email protected] for more information.
Midwesterners’ convenience store routines are likely to stay in place. Respondents from the Midwest, Region 3, were more likely to plan to stay home than their regional counterparts and shared that they plan to visit convenience stores with about the same frequency through the last months of 2023.
Customers in South Central (Region 4) and Central (Region 5) were more likely than last year to travel for Thanksgiving, with an increase of 2 and 3.3 points, respectively.
The West (Region 6) saw an increase in December travel plans of 2.2 points, with about 40% of respondents saying they planned to travel in December. Customers in this region were the most likely to anticipate traveling in January.