Our latest white paper looks at six brands that are leading their category and continuing to attract visitors amidst ongoing inflation and tightening consumer budgets. Below is a taste of our findings. Inflation has taken center stage over the past few months. With the current price hikes affecting daily spending, shoppers are increasingly considering “trading down” – substituting their regular brands with lower-priced alternatives. But although consumers are adopting a more value-conscious behavior, foot traffic data indicates that the true state of retail is not as bleak as may be expected.
Target Deal Days have come a long way since the company first launched the event in 2018. Initially scheduled to overlap with Amazon’s Prime Day, the Deal Days slowly but surely took on a life of their own. In October 2021, Target kicked off the extended holiday shopping season with its first independent Deal Days event and the second Deal Days of the year, in a move that is now being used by Amazon. And this year, Target’s October Deal Days took place October 6th to 8th 2022 – almost a week before Amazon’s first-ever second Prime Day of the year scheduled for October 11-12.
The brick-and-mortar apparel category has faced a unique set of challenges. Two years of a pandemic drastically changed the nature of in-person shopping and gave way to the most significant consumer price index jump in 40 years. Still, the segment had plenty of bright spots – including the five apparel brands featured here. As previously explored, the shoe category has performed impressively over the past few years, and this continues to be true, especially for one of the fastest-growing chains identified.
Wawa, a leader in the gas and convenience store space, recently announced plans to nearly double its store count by 2030. The chain is also testing a new drive-thru channel to sell its fresh food offerings. We dove into the foot traffic data to take a closer look at Wawa’s success and see what the company’s standalone drive-thru’s performance reveals about Wawa’s QSR potential.
With many employers still struggling to bring workers back to the office, we took a look at September 2022 office foot traffic data to find out where the workplace recovery stands heading into Q4 2022. Over the past couple of months, New York City office workers have consistently outpaced both the nationwide and other major cities in both year-over-three-years (Yo3Y) and year-over-year (YoY) monthly office foot traffic numbers.
These Indexes analyze data from more than 100 top-tier indoor malls, 100 open-air lifestyle centers (not including outlet malls) and 100 outlet malls across the country, in both urban and suburban areas. Placer.ai uses anonymized location information from a panel of 30 million devices and processes the data using industry-leading AI and machine learning capabilities to make estimations about overall visits to specific locations. A confluence of factors, including ongoing economic headwinds and a challenging comparison to a uniquely strong 2021 Back to School shopping period, positioned shopping centers for a challenging summer season.
Our latest white paper draws on Crexi’s commercial real estate data insights and Placer.ai’s foot traffic intelligence to show how recent migration trends and overall population growth are uniquely impacting the local retail space in six growing cities. Below is a taste of our findings. To find out which up-and-coming markets made the cut, what is driving retail recovery in each area, and unique ways CRE players can capitalize on these changes
Few things are as iconic as the American diner, serving up plates of pancakes and eggs. Over the past few decades, this dining concept has evolved from local stand-alone establishments to regional and national chains. Inflation and other macro headwinds have put pressure on restaurant visitation trends the past several months, but full-service breakfast chains have outperformed the industry. We catch up with several breakfast and brunch restaurant leaders and take a look at how they are positioning themselves as an affordable luxury and leveraging their knowledge of their customer base to succeed.
Miami’s tourism sector has been on a serious upswing for the past few years. The city, and wider state of Florida, saw higher-than-nationwide average visits throughout the course of the pandemic. Driven in part by loose COVID restrictions, tourism was up nearly every quarter since the pandemic began, and these trends are only accelerating now that international travel is returning and airport staffing challenges slow down.
Citi Trends is a rising star in the off-price retail sector and has big plans for expansion and remodeling. We dove into the foot traffic data to analyze Citi Trends’ visit growth and see how the chain stacks up against other top retailers in the off-price space. Citi Trends owes much of its success to an aggressive expansion and remodeling strategy. According to CEO David Makuen, the remodels – dubbed CTx – highlight curated product assortments and enhance the customer experience. In 2021 the chain opened 27 new stores and remodeled 25 others.
Starbucks, the most prolific coffee chain in the country, recently unveiled a dramatic expansion plan. The chain hopes to not only add 2,000 stores to its nearly 16,000-strong fleet by 2025 but to also new implement new strategies in a bid to maximize sales and customer reach by embracing technology. We dove into the foot traffic data for the coffee giant to understand what lies behind this decision and whether the opportunity is really there.
Our latest white paper dives into retail media networks and explores several retailers on the cutting edge of this advertising revolution. Below is a taste of our findings. In spite of the gloomy predictions regarding the future of brick and mortar retail, major retailers are continuing to see their physical visits outnumber their online ones. Visits to Walmart and Target’s U.S. venues alone significantly outpace the brands’ global online reach, according to web data from Similarweb.
The home improvement sector was one of the biggest retail winners of 2020 and 2021. But in the first half of 2022, inflation caused consumers to think twice about home improvement projects that could break the bank. We looked at six leading brands in the home improvement sector – Lowe’s Home Improvement, The Home Depot, Tractor Supply Co., Ace Hardware, Menards, and Sherwin-Williams Paint Store – to see if we could spot renewed foot traffic trends that could indicate broader consumer confidence and discretionary spending health.
The Darden Restaurant Group is one of the world’s largest full-service restaurant groups. With eight restaurant chains in over 1,800 locations, the company owns and manages some of the biggest names in the dining industry. When we last looked at Darden, visits were starting to pick up following a tough year of pandemic restrictions. Now, as grocery costs are rising, we checked back in to see how these restaurants are being impacted by the current economic environment.
The return of pumpkin-themed menu items signals the arrival of fall in the coffee space. Over the years, everything from pumpkin spice lattes to pumpkin muffins have gained a massive following. We dove into the foot traffic data for two leading QSRs – Starbucks and Dunkin’ Donuts – to take a closer look at how the launch of fall menu items drove visits to the chains. To analyze the impact of Dunkin’s and Starbucks’ fall menu launches, we compared each chain’s average visits in the five weeks prior to its fall menu launch to visits in the seven days post-launch.
Although few consider the northeastern states a prime fast-food destination, foot traffic data reveals that QSR visits are skyrocketing in New England and New York, with regional growth significantly outpacing the nationwide average. While the data doesn’t fully capture deliveries, drive-thru visits, or online order pick-ups, the data can still provide a sense of the regional strength of the category.
As inflation continues to strain consumer budgets and retail sales, Labor Day Weekend presented a chance to grab last-minute back-to-school and early-bird holiday deals. Though shoppers remained budget-conscious, there are strong indications that these concerns are beginning to subside. We dove into the foot traffic data across multiple retail categories to take a closer look at the shift in discretionary spending ushered in by Labor Day 2022.
Our most recent white paper takes a closer look at the ripple effects domestic migration can have on local industries. We examined how office buildings, grocery stores, smaller cities, and even restaurant preferences are reacting to seemingly small fluctuations in local demographics. We explore one such change below. For in-depth insights into the way domestic migration can shape an industry.
Back to School 2022 brought significant pressure to retail. There was a real impression that the post-pandemic environment’s first true retail season could provide a needed boost for chains across the sector. Yet, the onslaught of economic headwinds presented a uniquely difficult scenario that proved to be a formidable challenge for brick-and-mortar retail visits. But the season was not all struggles and, in fact, presented hope that the coming months could already be providing a needed shift.
We’ve covered the office recovery extensively over the past year. With the recovery entering a more stable phase, we examined office foot traffic trends and looked at how the prevalence of different kinds of employers in each city is impacting the local workplace recoveries. The pandemic seems to have permanently changed office norms, and most businesses have accepted that hybrid work is here to stay. But while foot traffic has yet to return to pre-pandemic levels, offices nationwide are seeing a slow but steady visits recovery.
