Who shops at Fred Meyer?

1
Who shops at Fred Meyer?

• Qualitative Research by
• Becky Ellis and
• Cathy Holtcamp

2
Procedures and Methods

• Our research question Is there a dominant theme
  for the shoppers at a local Fred Meyer?

3
Procedures and Methods

• Design Emergent research design with time
  sampling data collection.
• Observations were made in 1 hour increments at
  different times and different days.

4
Procedures and Methods

• Cathy began to see a theme emerge and began
  taking notes as to the age of shopper and whether
  the shopper was alone or not.
• Data was collected by observation only at various
  times Thursday late morning, Saturday early
  evening, Sunday early afternoon and Monday early
  evening.

5
Procedures and Methods

• Becky observed the shoppers from the vantage
  point of the in-store Deli.

6
Procedures and Methods

• Cathy observed the shoppers from a bench across
  from the U-Scan check out

7
Procedures and Methods

• Data was collected without pre-conceived ideas.
  No discussion was attempted prior to the data
  collection.
• The data was well triangulated using 2
  researchers at the same location but at different
  days and times. Observations were made at 4
  different times and days.

8
Procedures and Methods

• Trustworthiness
• Prolonged engagement 4 hours
• Persistent observation - several days
• Well triangulated
• Peer debriefing done after all data was collected
• Data was shared, compiled and analyzed during the
  debriefing
• Study was thin, but sufficient data was obtained

9
Analysis

• We started with a rich description of the
  shoppers we observed until half way through we
  discovered a theme presenting itself.
• Using emergent design we began to code our
  observations differently.

10
Analysis

• Single verbs were used to describe the shoppers
  we saw
• Age
• Under 20, 20-40, 40-60 and over 60
• Gender
• Male, female
• Status
• Single, couple, or family

11
Analysis

• Coding was done by consensus and the rich
  descriptions were changed to simple categories
• There was active dialog as to where the shopper
  fit in the new scheme
• Shoppers fit into one of 14 different categories
• No inference was made about the thoughts,
  feelings, or actions of the shopper

12
Findings

• The dominant theme that emerged was that shoppers
  are solitary figures that do not interact with
  others while shopping

13
Findings

• Exemplar Solitary female entered the store,
  bought a few items, knew how to work the machine,
  paid with cash using the correct amount of bills
  and change, exited the store without uttering a
  word.

14
Findings

• Additional Themes
• 62 of shopping done by females
• Thursday found 28 of shoppers fit the family
  category (one or more children with a parent)
• Largest group of shoppers, 44 were females
  between the ages of 20-40
• 21.5 shopped alone and 22.5 shopped as a family

15
Findings

• One over-arching concept emerged Americans have
  gone from using the shopping experience as a
  social event to a solitary event.

16
Implications

• Marketing tool
• Health Promotion
• Used to target certain populations for
  sampling purposes (if the target population is
  solitary middle aged females you could find them
  at Fred Meyer on a Saturday afternoon)

17
Limitations

• Observations were sporadic
• Limited to 4 one-hour sessions
• Data collection was superficial in nature

18
Conclusion

• The research question was answered without doubt.
• The dominant shopper at this local Fred Meyer is
  female, solitary, middle-aged.