More than two years have passed since the act on the Sunday trading ban came into life. At that time, the consumer behavior of Poles evolved, causing visible changes in the trends of visiting retail outlets. The gradual introduction of an increasing number of trade-free Sundays and the restrictions associated with the coronavirus pandemic have also had an impact on this process.
In our research, we looked at purchasing trends in various types of stores. This topic we took the first time 2 years ago - A year after the Sunday trading ban: discounters, drugstores and gas stations are the biggest beneficiaries. The chart below shows changes in the percentage of visits to shopping centers on individual days of the week since 2018:
“There is a visible trend of increasing customer traffic on Mondays (in the weeks preceding the analysis, Sundays were mostly trade-free), where an increase was recorded from 14.3 % in 2018, by 14.6% in 2019, to 16.4%. in 2020”, says Marcin Augustyniak, Client Director of Data Tank Selectivv.
In recent years, the most popular days shopping have been:
The biggest change concerns trading Sundays, the percentage of which is decreasing - starting at 14.5% in 2018 and currently stopping at 11.1%.
There are also changes in the trends of visits to supermarkets and discount stores, but they are smaller, which can be seen in the chart below:
Similarly to shopping malls, there is an increase in visits on Mondays, from 14.3% in 2018 to 16.1 % this year. The most popular shopping days where:
The number of visits also decreased at supermarkets and discount stores on Fridays. In 2018 it was 15.2% of all visits, this year the percentage was 13.9%.
The situation was quite different in the case of local stores, where in 2020 there was an increase in visits on Thursdays and Fridays (from 12.8% in 2019 to 16.2% in 2020 and from 12.8% to 16%, respectively) and declines on Saturdays (from 15% in 2019 to 13.3% in 2020), Sundays (from 16.5% to 14.5%) and Mondays (from 15.2% to 13.5%). The most popular days in both 2018 and 2019 were Sundays with 15.1% and 16.5% share, respectively. This year, however, the most popular day is Thursday with a 16.2% share. We also note a systematic decline in visits to these stores on Wednesdays:
The situation is different in the weeks with non-trade Sunday. The most popular days were Fridays in 2018 (18.3%), in 2019 Saturdays (18.5%), and in the current year - Wednesdays (18.4%):
It was on Wednesdays that we saw a large increase in visits to shopping centers, from 15.5 % in 2018 to 18.4% in 2020. We also see a general increase in visits from Monday to Thursday, and a decline on Fridays and Saturdays.
Similarly, in the case of supermarkets and discount stores, a decline in visits is observed on Fridays and Saturdays. Interestingly, the most popular days in 2018 were Saturdays (19.5%), and in 2019 Fridays (17.7%). This year these are Wednesdays (18%), for which we recorded the largest increase, from 15.7% in 2018 to 18% in 2020:
We see different results for local convenience stores. Often they are also open on non-trading Sundays:
The most popular day in 2018 was Thursday (16.1%), in 2019 Wednesday (16.2%), and this year it is Friday (15.6%). We recorded an increase in visits on Fridays and Sundays compared to the previous year (from 14.1% in 2019 to 15.6% in 2020 and from 11.2% in 2019 to 13.5% in 2020). In addition, the number of visits to local stores increases noticeably on Tuesdays (from 12.7% in 2018 to 14.5% in 2020) and decreases on Thursdays (in 2018 it was 16.1%, and this year 14.8%).
The research was conducted on the basis of historical data from the location from mobile devices. The research sample covered 2.084.475 visits to selected commercial locations (shopping centers, local stores, supermarkets and discount stores) in 2018-2020. The data was broken down by weeks with trading and non-trading Sundays, with the days of the week in each group.
There are several correlations in the data presented, such as an increase in visits to shopping centers, supermarkets, and discount stores on Mondays on non-trade Sunday's weeks, or a general increase in visits in the middle of the week. Interesting is the fact of the decline in visits to discount stores and shopping malls on Sundays, even when they are open. Poles more and more often choose other forms of activity on the weekends, less often devoting this time to shopping, as opposed to last year, which we have already written about on our blog.
