Inside the Consumer Mind: A Slow Climb

Since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic in the United States, daily convenience store transactions have declined between 10 percent and 25 percent year over year, according to the newly released AlixPartners 2021 Convenience Store Industry Outlook. In this study of 1,001 U.S. adult consumers across all regions, demographics and income levels, 29 percent of respondents said they didn’t make even one visit to a c-store in the past week. And when asked about the next six months, 26 percent said they will stay away from c-stores for the time being. There is some good news for c-store operators, however: visit frequency overall is expected to increase in the near-term, and consumers say there are some things retailers can do to entice them back.