Dive Brief:
- Foot traffic at several key banners operated by Albertsons has grown consistently throughout 2024 — and the trend has picked up momentum over the past several months — according to newly released data from Placer.ai.
- Visits to Safeway stores, which account for about 40% of Albertsons’ approximately 2,270 supermarkets, rose nearly 8% year-over-year in June, Placer.ai reported. Jewel-Osco and Tom Thumb stores saw visits increase by around 11% last month, while Shaw’s notched foot traffic growth of almost 12%.
- Albertsons is seeing robust foot traffic across multiple banners as the retailer angles to complete its planned merger with Kroger.
Dive Insight:
Foot traffic growth for Safeway, Jewel-Osco, Tom Thumb and Shaw’s was higher in June than during the prior month, when the banners all recorded stronger foot traffic growth than they did in April, Placer.ai found.
The retail analytics firm, which uses location data from people’s mobile devices to compute foot traffic patterns, also found that multiple Albertsons banners have seen a rising proportion of visits from shoppers who visited at least four times per month over the past two years.
More than 56% of Safeway visitors fell into that category in June, up about 2 percentage points compared with the same month in 2022. United Supermarkets saw just under 60% of its shoppers stop by four or more times in June, compared with about 59% during that period two years ago. Other Albertsons chains, including its namesake banner, Jewel-Osco, Shaw’s, Acme, Vons and Tom Thumb, have also seen loyalty rates increase since mid-2022, Placer.ai reported.
“The rise in loyalty rates across all banners indicates that Albertsons’ focus on enhancing customer experience and engagement has paid off,” Placer.ai said in a blog post about the company’s findings. “As the chain continues to lay the groundwork for its planned merger with Kroger, its increasingly loyal customer base will remain a powerful asset.”
Despite this strong recent performance, Albertsons’ banners make up the vast majority of locations the grocer along with Kroger aim to divest as part of their planned merger. This includes nearly 300 Safeway locations, which is close to a third of that banner’s entire fleet.
