Be Available Conveniently

“I sure failed to be highly satisfied at your shop. I’ll be back soon!”
     According to Consumer Edge Insight survey results, this could serve as the tag line for McDonald’s. Data from the online Restaurant DemandTracker survey of adult consumers were weighted so the results are representative of the U.S. adult population who visit a restaurant at least once each three months. Only 22% of McDonald’s customers said they were extremely satisfied with their last visit. This was the lowest percentage for the twenty Quick Service Restaurant (QSR) chains covered. But 64% of the sample said they are extremely likely to visit a McDonald’s again. This was among the three highest percentages in the project. The top percentage was only four points higher, at 68%, for Subway.
     Why would people want to go back to eat at a place that failed to provide a highly satisfying experience? The answer is that the McDonald’s customers had sought convenience above all. To get convenience, they were willing to settle for food described by Boston chef Michael Schlow as, “Consistently bad. Like leftovers from a hospital cafeteria.” In the DemandTracker ratings, McDonald’s earned first place in the category of “convenient locations.”
     Other consumers place a relatively higher importance on the quality of the merchandise and service. But all of them appreciate convenience, so be ready to deliver:

• Location. You’ve always been interested in selecting a store location that has good traffic of people constituting your target market. But do you have store vacancies in your immediate area for which you could recruit retailers offering products or services which would draw people who are in your target market? You then become the convenient location for shoppers buying what you sell. 
• Hours. You can’t be the convenient place if your store is closed when people want to shop. If you’ve been opening later to save staff expenses, think about again expanding hours. 
• In-stock. And you can’t be the convenient shopping place if you’re out of stock for what shoppers expect to find. As with store hours, you may have been cutting back to preserve dollars. Now’s the time to consider expanding your in-stock position. 
• Checkout & returns. Can you use single-line queuing like the banks do in order to give a sense of faster movement? Are your payment and return procedures as convenient as they can be while protecting against employee and customer fraud? 

Click below for more: 
Build Up Shopping Convenience 
Structure Your Layout for Shopper Mission 
Get Small with Big Convenience