Families using home-delivery services bought the bulk of their groceries online, according to the data. But the same households also increased the number of shopping trips they made to a variety of brick-and-mortar stores, the researchers find: in-person grocery shopping rose almost 9 percent among families using Instacart and similar services.
What seemed to happen was a “fragmentation” of shopping habits, Cao says. “People were going online and using Instacart and other platforms to have their shopping delivered, but they weren’t substituting this for a trip to the store as much as we might think,” she says. “We find that they were still heading out to buy other items, especially those less essential household ones.”
As a result, these households spent 16 percent more on groceries every week, Cao and her colleagues find. Although some of that was for home-delivered goods, households still increased average weekly spending at grocery stores by 5 percent.
The researchers find that when people used home-delivery services in combination with in-person shopping trips, they tended to seek out a broader range of stores and household products. Families using home-delivery services were about 30 percent more likely to subsequently check out new physical stores compared with those that weren’t getting groceries delivered.
The diversification of shopping habits—the urge to try something new and different—could come down to exposure to variety and information that comes with online shopping and home delivery, the researchers explain.
“Having our groceries delivered to the door saves us time and effort, which is great,” Cao says. “Households can then redirect their attention to unplanned needs and items.” In addition, she says, “sites such as Instacart offer consumers an increased selection, an ease of searching, and detailed product information. This in turn could be whetting customers’ appetite to try out new products and to simply buy more—a case of shopping begetting shopping.”
And then there is the social dimension of shopping, Cao observes. “Home-delivery services don’t substitute for the pleasure and enjoyment we get from jumping in the car and heading to the store to browse and interact with other people,” she says.
This positive social dimension isn’t enough to offset the environmental concerns, however, particularly among policymakers seeking to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
