As consumers prioritise speed, efficiency and price when it comes to their weekly shop destination, is exciting retail theatre facing the final curtain?
Is retail theatre dead? It’s a reasonable question to ask when visiting your standard supermarket today. The cafés, scratch bakeries and counters that once offered the ‘personal touch’ are largely gone. In their place are self-serve bays and banks of self-checkouts. All in all, supermarket visits can feel increasingly utilitarian – the only difference being the colour of the loyalty card scanned.
So, in the age of efficiency drives, have supermarkets given up on providing ‘theatre’? If so, what are the new priorities for in-store experience? How are retailers bringing excitement to shoppers, and what does the future look like?
Retailers still care about engaging their shoppers, insists John Ryan, director of store analysis service Newstores. However, he believes the concept of retail theatre depends on how you choose to define it. There has been a move away from thinking about retail theatre in its “purest form” – beautifully laid out but costly counters or displays, for example – towards an experience based on value, ease of shop and convenience.
That shift in mindset has been driven by an increasingly competitive grocery market, says Toby Pickard, senior partner for retail futures at IGD. The rise of the discounters and pricing pressures have become the primary focus.
“Retailers do care about making their large stores a pleasant, enjoyable and engaging place to shop. However, price and efficiency are dominant priorities at the moment, given the cost of living pressures on consumers and the rising costs and challenges that retailers face,” Pickard explains.
Shopper priorities
That aligns with shopper priorities. Lower prices, proximity to home and availability came out as the top three priorities in choosing a weekly shop, in a YouGov poll of 2,074 UK shoppers published in January 2024.
More feel-good elements, like store design and service, were left trailing behind. In fact, good customer service came below availability of parking in the list of priorities.
The Grocer’s own research last year on the rollout of self-checkouts showed a similar trend. Despite regular headlines bemoaning the death of customer service, 54% said they actually preferred self-checkouts – primarily due to speed and higher availability compared with manned tills.
There was one important caveat: 61% named technical issues as the biggest disadvantage in self-checkouts. But their popularity highlights an important shopper mindset. For many, a good store experience increasingly means being able to get in and out quickly with the goods they need.
Supermarkets have been “fine-tuning” their offers to adapt to these changing consumer priorities, says Kate Hardcastle, consumer expert and author of The Science of Shopping. In the main, it’s a process they’re still working through.
“Retailers are sophisticated enough to know that if they do retail theatre badly, disingenuously or inauthentically, it’s not worth doing. What they’ve done is doubled down on what matters because we understand that in this moment of sort-of-revolution, truth and authenticity really matter,” Hardcastle says.
Sainsbury’s ongoing store investment plan is one example of how that’s playing out in practice. “To me, retail theatre means relevance,” says Sainsbury’s director of future stores and customer experience Darren Sinclair. The sentence sums up the mindset behind the grocer’s ongoing “mission-based” strategy for stores.
“It’s thinking about: ‘How does a store or a business show up for customers in the most relevant way?’ Take the seasonal aisle: Where’s it located? Does the store use its assets to talk to the customer about what they want?” Sinclair says.
Sainsbury’s has stripped back ‘theatre’ in the traditional sense – removing its in-store scratch bakeries, for example – in favour of measures designed to create a more seamless shopping journey. It has used technology like its SmartShop shopping tool, streamlined in-store signage – to use only purple or red colours – and revamped layouts to improve the shop floor experience.
“Screens are as much theatre as anything involving somebody carving up a fish at a counter”
John Ryan, Newstores
For example, the supermarket is increasingly grouping together items that are commonly bought as a bundle. Strawberries are now merchandised alongside prosecco. It’s also catering to grab-and-go shoppers by moving alcohol aisles to more central locations near checkouts.
“If you think about retail theatre as something that reduces friction for customers, then that’s a good idea,” Sinclair says.
To varying degrees, it’s a pattern that’s being repeated across the sector, Pickard says. “We’re seeing new and interesting ways of ranging and merchandising across categories like healthcare, beers, wines and spirits and petcare, while meal solutions are helping make shoppers’ lives easier and more convenient,” he adds.
One example is the introduction of dedicated ‘free-from sections’ by Tesco, Morrisons and Sainsbury’s. They group together frozen, ambient and chilled products that are gluten-free, dairy-free or similar, in one area of the store.
Suppliers filling the void
Digital retail media networks are playing a key part in this more practical iteration of in-store theatre. Although primarily a revenue driver, they offer increasingly valuable opportunities to “engage” shoppers in store, Ryan says.
“Putting up screens that change to inform you about stuff depending on the time of day is as much theatre as anything involving somebody carving up a fish at a counter,” he points out.
It’s not just screens. Developments in digital printing technology over the past decade mean it’s now much cheaper for supermarkets and brands to launch “localised” PoS campaigns that target a handful of stores in a specific location, says Nick Stagg, director of new business development at PoS manufacturer Augustus Martin.
Take a recent partnership between Red Bull and Sainsbury’s in Leeds. The energy drink giant, which sponsors Leeds United FC, rolled out freestanding paper arch displays to Sainsbury’s supermarkets in the city to celebrate the team’s promotion to the Premier League in May.
Such “hyperlocal” marketing campaigns are now a “huge market” for printers like Augustus Martin, according to Stagg. Supermarkets are also increasingly personalising PoS to specific stores by linking to local events or through mentioning the relevant town or city in seasonal displays – “Merry Christmas Brentwood!” for example.
Pop-up paper PoS and digital displays offer increasing opportunities to engage shoppers in a way that resonates with them, says Stagg. At the same time, though, their effectiveness relies greatly on location in store and good execution by the store’s team.
“There’s also a middle ground to flooding stores with PoS and activations where it just becomes white noise,” Stagg cautions.
Sainsbury’s Sinclair agrees “theatre should be a value add for customers”, rather than an annoyance. On that basis, the supermarket is working to ensure its network of 2,000 digital screens only promote products that are immediately available nearby.
“Shoppers are asking ‘why?’ more than ever, and if something is a gimmick they will see it”
Chris Newell, Syn
It’s similarly important to recognise quickly when something isn’t working and might actually be detracting from the in-store experience, he adds.
For example, last year, Sainsbury’s trialled its first digital touch screens at its Cobham and Witney ‘future stores’. Located in key aisles such as beauty, shoppers could use the screens to search for product locations in store without having to find a member of staff – theoretically making the shopping trip easier.
However, shoppers “didn’t like them”, according to Sinclair, and Sainsbury’s has now paused the rollout. “It [retail theatre] cannot disrupt the shopping journey,” he adds.
That message is hammered home by Chris Newell, creative director and co-founder of creative retail design agency Syn. “If any element of retail theatre is to work, it needs to be relevant to the customers,” he stresses. “Shoppers are asking ‘why?’ more than ever before, and if something is a gimmick, they will see it. It’s about delivering value in the product you’re selling to them.”
Injecting excitement
But even in this functional environment, there is still room for creativity. There remain plenty of examples of retailers taking steps to inject excitement and engagement into their customers’ daily or weekly shops.
Several experts cite M&S Foodhalls as the standout example of an in-store environment that is getting it right. “They’ve got buttons you can press to listen to the sound of a happy chicken. Or you can listen to cows mooing in the dairy area. All of which is absolutely about engagement,” Ryan says.
Such features are combined with farm shop-style fixtures such as a self-serve cheese, deli and fruit carts.
“They’ve played around with the idea of less service and more self-service, but on the other hand they haven’t abandoned the idea of engaging with the shopper,” Ryan adds.
Meanwhile, premium rival Waitrose is doubling down on service and counters as part of its store renovation plan, which kicked off at its revamped John Barnes store on London’s Finchley Road in August 2024.
“Theatre doesn’t need to be all-singing, all-dancing entertainment”
Chris Newell, Syn
It features enhanced bakery and food-to-go sections, including a new Hot Wok cooking counter where a staff member rustles up food to order. The store also features Waitrose’s first fully chilled wine, beers and spirits area.
Ryan also highlights Whole Foods Market’s new 21,800 sq ft outlet on King’s Road in Chelsea as a store that elevates customer experience through formats.
Inside Whole Foods Market’s new store
Whole Foods Market opened its 21,800 sq ft store on Chelsea’s King’s Road (pictures, left) in March to much fanfare. It is the retailer’s first new UK store for a decade and kicks off a renewed nationwide expansion plan.
It is also the first time the retailer has combined elements of its new Daily Shop US convenience format with the “theatre” and full range of its standard food halls found in the UK.
Smaller than its existing stores, the site is designed to feel like a local deli. The walls are decorated with tiles, while murals throughout give a nod to the local area.
The front of the store is designed to appeal to passing trade with a coffee bar that serves hot drinks and pastries to go.
Shoppers then pass through a farm shop-style fruit & veg market before reaching the grocery section, where they’ll find cheese, meat and fish counters, as well as an in-store pizza oven and even a grind-your-own peanut butter station.
That’s on top of plenty of live in-store sampling and an impressive range and display of fresh produce.
“People enjoy being in there. If people are enjoying themselves, it can be considered some form of retail theatre,” says John Ryan, managing director of Newstores.
Elevating the offer further, Whole Foods has also added an Amazon click & collect counter at the back of the store. Plus, it has brought a boutique feel to the ‘beauty hall’ by sectioning the area off from the rest of the store and lowering the lighting.
Whole Foods has taken the opportunity to educate its shoppers about its range, too.
Customers can learn more about the 115-plus preservatives, flavourings and colourings found in its foods by scanning a QR code, while PoS signs highlight ‘local’ products that have been sourced from greater London.
The single-storey model will form the basis of the retailer’s future stores, says Whole Foods Market international VP Rick Bonin.
And looking beyond grocery, “Holland & Barrett’s latest stores have really focused on experience, clear and concise in-store communication and personalised services,” says Pickard. These include a new “experience store” in Cardiff that was designed by Newell’s agency, Syn. It includes a dedicated wellness space, as well as interactive displays throughout.
All four are examples of premium or specialist retailers who give added weight – and the attendant budget – to in-store service and excitement as a key part of their brand.
But there’s no reason the traditional supermarket giants can’t replicate the same principles, says Newell. “Theatre doesn’t need to be all-singing, all-dancing entertainment,” he says. “It’s about having some effort there to make something look and feel nice.”
More at Morrisons
There are already signs some of the traditional big four are returning to these principles again.
In May, Morrisons launched a major overhaul of its Market Street proposition with the aim of creating a “premium farm shop feel” while retaining “a laser focus on clear pricing and value”.
Counters will be elevated with more “value-added” products such as marinated meats, alongside the rollout of more value-focused gondola ends and dedicated “mix and match” bays. Morrisons is also aiming to boost its suppliers by adding more branded bays.
Supermarkets like Morrisons are still in the “teenage years” of working out how to elevate their store experience in a retail sector that’s dramatically different to a decade ago, says Hardcastle.
She believes potentially game-changing developments are on the cards. Supermarkets will be learning to capitalise on and combine their digital retail networks, shopper data and brand partnerships, while brands themselves will hope to enhance the in-store experience in ways that capture their tone of voice and educate customers, Hardcastle says.
“There will be more sensory experiences and more education through experiences. There’ll be fewer short-lived pieces that are spectacle, and we’ll see far more quality of offer where it comes.”
Developments in technology will further enhance those opportunities for supermarkets, says Pickard. For example, retailers will be able to roll out more personalised pricing and promotions using geolocation in handheld scanners. They will also be able to use shopper data to “create new and unique ways to engage with shoppers to help build loyalty”.
So in the case of retail theatre, it appears there is still life – just not in the way we know it. And if it can offer excitement and practicality, all the better.
Overseas supermarkets going big on theatre
Edeka (Germany)
“Retailers like Edeka in Germany have transformed some stores into temples of gastronomy that elevate food and drink far beyond the transactional,” says Bryan Roberts, global insight leader at IGD. Its store in Düsseldorf is a case in point. As well as standard counters, it offers dine-in areas where food is prepared on the spot, blurring the lines between supermarket and restaurant. Specialist counters such as a mozzarella bar and a premium beef bar are joined by regular food festivals and guest chef events.
Stew Leonard’s (US)
In all seven Stew Leonard’s stores, customers are treated to all-singing, all-dancing animatronic displays. There are ‘The Avocado Girls’, who belt out a tune extolling the health benefits of avocados, while boasting dazzling eyelashes. Then there’s ‘The Farm Fresh Five’, a band of singing milk cartons. The stores follow an atypical one-way aisle system (similar to Ikea) and go big on samples. “You can basically eat your way through the store, and that’s just fun,” says Chase Leonard, a third-generation member of the owning family.
Freshippo (China)
Freshippo can’t stop experimenting. Store formats run the gamut from Freshippo Farmers’ Markets to Freshippo Pick’n Go – a breakfast stand selling on-the-go breakfast foods all day. As part of the Alibaba Group, Freshippo also capitalises on huge amounts of data to understand customers’ needs and wants. It offers in-store cooking options, while as part of its self-described “mobile-first shopping experience”, its app provides live, personalised food and drink recommendations that pair with items in shoppers’ baskets.
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