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New @Displaydata / @PlanetRetailRNG Research

New research launched today by Displaydata and Planet Retail RNG­ reveals that inaccurate, inconsistent pricing and a lack of digital technology in-store is costing retailers in lost sales and consumer trust, as price-conscious shoppers seek out the best deal and better experiences online.

The research report, ‘Analogue to Automated: Retail in the Connected Age’ – which surveyed 5000 consumers and 1000 retailers sought to understand what consumers want from physical stores, and how retailers are responding.

The findings clearly show that retailers are failing to keep up with shifting consumer attitudes towards price and promotion and are unable to engage with shoppers digitally, in real-time, when they are on the shop floor.

The positive news for retailers struggling with rising rents, squeezed margins and online competition, is that shoppers are decidedly tolerant of ‘agile’ or ‘dynamic’ pricing if it saves them money and reduces waste. In fact, contrary to recent speculation, the research found:

The research also strongly points to increased consumer desire for a more digital and connected shopping experience that meets their expectations around pricing, promotions and availability, and matches the information shoppers can get online, such as competitors’ prices, stock levels and more:

Andrew Dark, CEO, Displaydata told us “Our research shows that despite the huge changes retail has undergone in recent years, a fair and accurate price, consistent across channels, remains the key purchasing factor for the vast majority of shoppers, said However, to effectively harness the power of price, thrive against online competitors and retain shoppers’ trust, retailers must create a digitally connected environment to meet the high customer expectations that are being shaped by online experiences.”

Sarah Herrlein, senior retail analyst, Planet Retail said “Consumers today are digitally empowered with access to real time information on products, and they are more price sensitive than ever. Our research shows they expect a more consistent, automated experience, but their trust and faith in the store is lessening due to basic technological inefficiencies.” With retailers spending billions on things like manual price changes, the case for deploying digital technologies that optimise efficiencies, deliver the customer a better experience AND better value in-store, has never been greater.”

You can download a copy of the full report here [1].

Displaydata commissioned PlanetRetail RNG to survey 1,000 retailers and 4,811 consumers, across 10 countries. Every respondent had a senior management level of job designation or higher and worked for a retail organisation that operated stores and online or stores only, generating more than USD100 million in annual revenue. Every consumer, aged 18-65, had completed a purchase within a store within the week prior to taking the survey. The countries included in the survey were: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Germany, Hungary, Netherlands, Poland, Switzerland, the UK and the US**.

**n=100 retailer and n=350 consumer respondents per market, except for the UK and the US, where n=1,000 consumers per market.

[i] Over two thirds of retailers surveyed, confirmed that they spent between 1-4.99% of annual turnover on manually changing labels. PlanetRetail RNG calculated the median percentage of sales in each country to work out the comparative cost in sales of these manual changes, based on its database of total banner sales.