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Reports on the results from a consumer survey of shopping trips to supermarkets in England and Wales. Most people exhibit habits about when they do their main trip to the supermarket: 61 per cent have a usual day and 67 per cent a usual time of day. Most shoppers state that they could shop at other times but give reasons for their actual times that reflect situational pressures such as the pattern of work and nearness to the weekend. Many people state that they deliberately avoid busy shopping times and the survey showed that a small number of these people do so. However, there was no significant tendency for those who dislike checkout delay to shop at quieter times than for those who are tolerant of this delay. Store operators cannot change the main situational factors that control the time of use of stores and this limits their ability to influence when people shop. Nevertheless, the survey indicated that some increase in the use of off‐peak times could be achieved by permanent in‐store changes and better promotion of the off‐peak times.

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