Three Quarters Of Shoppers Have Bought 'Short Date' Products

Over three-quarters (78%) of consumers have purchased a product from a supermarket with its use-by date falling on the same day of purchase, according to new research by Empathy Research for Checkout's Retail Intelligence newsletter. In addition, over one third (35%) of the 1,015 participants also stated that they would purposely visit a supermarket at the end of the day to source 'short-date' products. Almost two-fifths (37%) of men admit that they would delay their shopping in order to benefit from these heavy discounts, slightly higher than female participants at 34%. 89% of participants who have purchased discounted products with shorter use-by dates would like to see more of these heavily discounted products in store. Factors mentioned by participants as influencing the purchase of short-date products includes whether the product appears to have 'gone off' (especially meat products), the quality of the packaging it is in, whether the product can be frozen for later use and if the discount is significant enough.