Types of Retailers, Brand Choice and New Products Trial: Challenges for the E-commerce of Consumer Packaged Goods

Abstract

Around 20% of shoppers are now online shoppers in the Spanish Consumer Packaged Goods (CPGs) market. Pure online shoppers (those who “most frequently” conduct their shopping online) and those called “mixed” shoppers (those who “occasionally” do it) seem to differ in their preferences, choices and behaviors, when it comes to shopping for CPGs. From another perspective, shoppers who choose to buy in “pure players”, such as Amazon, and those who prefer to buy in “click-and-mortar” stores, such as Carrefour online, also seem to differ in their behaviors. In this new competitive context, both manufacturers and retailers must learn how to attract and retain customers; whether these come from their own physical stores, or from a competitive one. Using an initial sample of 2,621 interviews, this paper explores the new online shopper types and behaviors from both abovementioned perspectives, while trying to find evidence of the differences in their choices between National Brands (NBs) and Retail Brands (PLs). Lastly, we also explore the challenges to innovation caused by the barriers that the new online context may have created to newly created products and brands.