Consumer Shopping Habits for Wellness and Environmentally ...

Table 13 - Example 2 of Core Consumer Channel Preferences
Macro-Category Primary/Preferred Secondary
Fresh Foods
Packaged Foods
Harris Teeter
Harris Teeter
Bi-Lo
OTC
VMHS
Internet Stores, Local Vitamin Shop
(remedies are herbal/homeopathic -
does not buy conventional OTC)
NA
CVS, Rite-Aid
Home Cleaning Internet Stores Harris Teeter, Bi-Lo
Personal Care Internet Stores Harris Teeter
General Merchandise for the Home Target -
Targeting Categories and SKU Mix to Health and Wellness Orientations
Channel and Consumer H+W Orientation
Retail channels vary with respect to their appeal to consumers of varying H+W orientations.
Matching up retail channels to product pathways, one can strategize in a general sense about what
type of product category and SKU mix should exist in any particular channel to please customers as
they currently exist.
In another sense, retailer strategies should look a bit beyond the current ―center of gravity‖ of H+W
appeal that their channel corresponds to, in order to maintain H+W relevance as time moves
forward. Recalling an earlier section of this report, both H+W consumers and the World of H+W itself
evolve, generally in toward (but often not into) the Core. So, for example, at the moment a
mainstream grocery store might largely appeal to those in the Periphery and outer portions of the
Mid-Level, that same store should make moves toward accommodating consumers that have moved
further into the Mid-Level to future-proof the store from a H+W standpoint. However, there are limits
to this as well, for instance, specialty grocers may not want to push their appeal too far toward the
Core given their existing, strong Mid-level appeal.
On the chart below, various channels are shown with both a ―center of gravity‖ showing where their
appeal is most intense in the context of H+W, as well as ―tails‖ that show, generally, how wide the
appeal extends (though to a less intense degree) into adjacent segments of H+W. For instance,
Mainstream Drug appeals most intensely to Periphery consumers concerned with convenience and
oriented toward more traditional OTC products (and Rx) in their understanding of ―health.‖ However,
their appeal also extends into the Mid-level, as they also offer some level of products that appeal to
Mid-level consumers e.g. some level of specialty supplements are typically present in most
Mainstream Drug stores. Definitions of each channel appear below the chart.
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