Women Dominate Grocery Shopping: Study

Women still dominate the retail marketplace, according to a study commissioned by the Private Label Manufacturers Association (PLMA) and conducted by global market researcher GfK Custom Research North America.

Although women’s personal and professional advancements have grown significantly in recent decades, their time spent grocery shopping has not decreased.

According to the report, “Today’s Primary Shopper,” two-thirds of women still handle most of the grocery shopping — with three-quarters of those women forming shopping lists, and 53 percent taking time to clip coupons and research sales. Six in 10 of the women surveyed spend more than an hour shopping in the supermarket.

Women also are the “rulers of the kitchen." According to the report, 84 percent of women are the sole preparer of meals in the household, with 61 percent of women stating that they prepare meals at least five times per week. The majority of these meals are not prepackaged, as 64 percent said they make most meals using fresh ingredients.

Aside from meal preparation and grocery shopping, women also are responsible for other important household areas: seven in 10 women said cleaning the house is their job, while three-fifths said they take on the majority of the laundry chores in the home.

Women have also become frequent store brand purchasers. For those who said they purchase store brand goods, the report reveals that most primary shoppers — about 87 percent — said they do so occasionally or more often, with about 45 percent saying they do so frequently, and only about 10 percent saying they rarely do so. Among those surveyed who describe their occupation as “homemaker,” the number of those who purchase private label products rises to 48.4 percent.

More than 1,000 women who were pre-qualified as their household’s primary shopper were surveyed. The survey was conducted to assess the role that women play in household shopping and thus how marketing strategies would be impacted for U.S. retailers and store brand suppliers.