Product Availability Survey: Brand Names More Important to Online Shoppers

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Posted Sep 24, 2012
Anne Pilon

Retail giant Walmart just announced that it will no longer sell Amazon’s Kindle e-reader in its stores. Reasons were not given, but Target recently made the same decision, leading many to believe that sales of the Kindle will drop. But will American consumers go out of their way to purchase such a product? Or does in-store product availability play a huge part in a product’s overall success?

walmart kindle

In Stores vs. Online

In Ask Your Target Market’s latest survey, 46% of consumers said that they prefer to shop in stores when making purchases over $100. 24% said they prefer to shop online for big purchases. And 30% said they have no preference between the two methods. Respondents under 35 were 6% more likely to shop online, and male respondents were 7% more likely to prefer online shopping.

Backup Options

Of those who at least sometimes shop in stores, 51% said that if a large product they really wanted was not at a nearby store, they would just try another local store. 31% said they would try buying the product online. 11% said they would just buy a similar product instead. And 5% said they wouldn’t buy it at all. Respondents under 35 were slightly more likely to be deterred from buying the product altogether. And of those who wouldn’t shop online even as a second resort, 50% said they would shop online if no brick and mortar stores carried the product they were looking for. Another 41% said they might buy the product online. And just 9% said they definitely wouldn’t shop online.

Brand Names

Some Americans might be more likely to seek out a specific product in specialty stores or online if they care about brand names. 15% of overall consumers said that brand names are very important to them when making large purchases. Another 57% said brand names are somewhat important. 24% said they are not very important. And just 4% of respondents said that brand names are not important to them at all. Brand names were less likely to be important to those who say they would not shop online for big purchases. You can view the complete survey results in the widget below and be sure to click “Open Full Report” to take advantage of all the chart and filter options.Photo Credit: IMG_9271 from FlickrWhat do you want to know? If you need some consumer insights on a particular topic, let us know in the comments below and we’ll consider it for an upcoming survey post.

Results were collected on September 21, 2012 via AYTM’s online survey panel.

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