[0:00]This is me, pulling up to Walmart on a Sunday morning to get some milk and dog food for Zoufry. My three-year-old German Shepherd. I walk in, go directly to the back of the store for the milk, and then pass by the pet foods aisle to grab dog food. As I was on my way out, something stupid starts to happen. Something I hate, but keeps happening whenever I come into a grocery store. I start wandering around the store with absolutely no clear intentions. From one aisle to the other, I keep putting stuff in my cart that I don't even need. I walked in to get two items, but somehow ended up with 13. But it seems like I'm not the only one who does this. It turns out grocery stores are perfectly designed to ensure that this keeps happening to millions of visitors every single day. They use every trick in the book to make us buy things we never intended on buying. We modeled the entire thing to show you the evil design of grocery stores.
[1:00]The grocery store, as we know it, began to take shape in the early 20th century. The first self-service grocery store, Piggly Wiggly, opened in 1916 in Memphis, Tennessee. Revolutionizing the shopping experience by allowing customers to browse and select their own items. This concept quickly gained popularity, leading to the rise of supermarket chains. As a result, notable chains like Kroger and A&P emerged, expanding across the United States and setting the stage for modern grocery retailing. Today, the grocery industry is a massive sector in the US economy. In 2023, retail and food service sales in the United States exceeded 8 trillion dollars. On average, shoppers spend about $174 per trip to the grocery store, a 12% increase from previous years. The industry comprises approximately 61,000 grocery stores, employing around 1.4 million people. These numbers clearly show that these companies are making money, and a lot of it. But before grocery stores looked the way we know today, they were designed way different back then. Before self-service models emerged, grocery shopping typically involved customers requesting items from behind a counter. However, with the introduction of self-service in 1916, the layout and design of grocery stores began to evolve dramatically. Piggly Wiggly turned things around. I don't know why anyone would name a company as such, but to their credit, they changed grocery stores forever. The open layout, the organized aisles, the directional lighting, these were all new additions to the grocery store design at the time. But before we go into the nitty-gritty of the numerous tricks they use to influence your purchasing decisions, we must establish how grocery stores actually make money. Most of us would think that grocery stores make their money by selling products. Although that's not quite wrong, they make the most of their revenue from something else. Grocery stores don't really make as much profit as you think. Their margins are as thin as 1% to 3%, which means if you spend $100 at a grocery store, they're going to end up making $1 to $3 at most out of the 100. Considering the tremendous amount of capital it takes to run a grocery store, it's almost impossible for companies to survive on such low profit margins. But they already know that. That's why grocery stores are not in the food business. In fact, they're in the real estate business. Let's first establish how the typical grocery store layout works. One of the common grocery store layouts is the grid. Your retail fixtures are arranged in long rows. They're also typically placed at right angles throughout your store, making it easier for customers to get a preview of what's in the aisle without having to go through it. From the width of the passages to the shelves dimensions, every square inch of the store is utilized to its fullest capacity. The grid layout also uses the loop concept, meaning the flow coming from the entrance should never cross paths with customers exiting. Making the whole shopping experience an actual loop where the customer is guided in and out of the store seamlessly. But one could argue, all of these design strategies are present in many commercial establishments, not just grocery stores. So where does the trickery actually begin? The manipulation starts the second you step inside the store. The first thing most shoppers typically encounter when they walk into a grocery store is what's called front of shop. In which you'd find the produce section, as well as the flower section. This isn't mere coincidence, it's by universal design. A store's produce section plays a large role in how much consumers will spend. Not only that, grocery stores use very specific directional lights aimed at fruits and vegetables to make their colors pop. Now, once your visual appetite is satisfied, stores have to make sure you don't just pick some fruits and bounce. They need you to walk by as many items as possible. This is when the traffic builder method comes into play. Ever wondered why milk and bread are always way at the back of the store? This tactic is designed to increase the likelihood of impulse purchases along the way. Since milk is a staple item, putting it at the back ensures that shoppers will pass by various other products, which means more impulse buys. That's also why some of the best deals are typically way at the back. Now, once they get you in the central section of the store, this is when they make the real money off of you. At the beginning of the video, I told you, grocery stores are in the real estate business. This is what I mean. 50% to 75% of grocery store's profit is from slotting fees. Food companies and brands spend a tremendous amount of money to place their products at a certain location inside stores. One product could spend between 10,000 to 100,000 to a million dollars to get just one product on a certain shelf right in front of your eyeballs. And that specific sweet spot on a certain shelf is called the golden zone. Products placed in the golden zone can sell eight times more than if they're on a different shelf. But what is exactly this golden zone? The golden zone in grocery store design refers to the area at 4 to 5 feet above the floor, which corresponds to the average shopper's eye level. To perfectly place the money-making shelves, grocery store designers use the average height of the local population as a reference point. At this height, most shoppers' eyes naturally fall, making it the ideal spot for placing high demand or high-margin products. The shelf design in itself is intentional. Shelves in the golden zone are typically 12 to 18 inches deep. This depth allows for easy access and visibility of products without overwhelming the shopper. But this golden zone changes according to aisles. For example, the golden zone for cereal is at around 3 feet from the ground. That's because the real customers in the cereal aisle are children. But the golden zone trick is definitely not the last. They also kind of tailor-make things to people who are right-handed. That's because 80% of the population is right-handed. According to research, right-handed people tend to look more on their right side than the left when shopping. That's why most of the products with higher profit margins are usually placed on the right side of the aisle. Also, more resistant floor textures that slow you down are placed next to products they want to push more. Now, once you put way more products in your cart than you intended to, you head out to the checkout line. But as soon as you may think you're safe, that's when you screw up even more. Grocery stores have found out that for every second a person has to wait before they get checked out, an impulse purchase increases by 0.4%. 16% of total sales are made in the front area, and 87% of those impulse buys are made three seconds before a customer gets checked out. In the modern grocery stores, the checkout aisle became a maze to fuel impulse purchases, especially during the holiday season. You're led through a winding corridor full of tempting small items for you to pick up along the way. Some stores intentionally leave out a couple of lines without a cashier, increasing the waiting time and checkout lines. All of this without mentioning the price tactics like the 99-cent trick, which increases sales by 24%, the flashy reduction signs, the pumping of fruity smells to enhance the overall experience, and the list goes on. Next time you stop by the grocery store, treat it as if you were walking into a casino. Grab the stuff from your list and get the hell out. 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