In-store sampling can increase the average household shopping basket size. As a result of the sampling event, the involved consumers’ overall shopping basket expenditure increased 10%, as compared to the average frequent shopper basket for the participating retailer. “This is a very interesting finding in that it suggests that sampling creates a positive purchasing environment for retail customers,” says Heffernan. “The theory, and we’ll want to do this at least 30 more times to prove it out, is that people who interact with sampling events are more valuable to a chain and ultimately tend to spend more than they intended. You might be getting an extra 10% per ring from these households.” “This does suggest sampling contributes to incremental growth and does not cannibalize other items within the brands’ own franchise,” add Stermer. “We think it helps contradict the old theory that during a sampling event, shoppers just replace an item that they were planning on buying with the sampled item.”
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In-store sampling delivers new buyers across the brand portfolio
In-store sampling can deliver new buyers both to the sampled items and to the brand franchise. The average cumulative (over a 20- week period) new buyers for the sampled products was 85%, according to the study, and 23% for the brand franchise. “This was very big news to all of the brand managers we’ve talked to,” says Rollberg. “Basically, the data shows that we brought new buyers in and we got them to come back. Maybe they were buying ‘brand A’ before, but they also bought the sampled brand on trial. We don’t know if, the next time they came back, they bought brand A again or not. But they definitely bought brand B again. So the data shows that we definitely brought people into a franchise that hadn’t been there before.”
Sampling is not just for new products anymore
Sampling has a well-established track record for boosting sales of new product launches. The R.I.S.E. study, however, demonstrates that in-store sampling can also dramatically lift sales for both line extensions and even established products. The sales lift from sampling the line extension (a new flavor simply added to an existing product line with little or no other promotional fanfare) was +919% for the day-of-event and 107% after a 20-week period. The sales lift from sampling the existing product (which was being re-staged with updated packaging) was +177% for day of event and +57% after a 20-week period. “Simply put,” says Stermer, “sampling is not just for new products anymore.”
In-store sampling events can drive repeat purchasing
R.I.S.E. reports that in-store sampling events can drive repeat purchasing. (Repeat is defined as a trial purchase plus at least one additional purchase at a later date within the 20-week study period.) Over the 20-week period, the average cumulative first- and additional-repeat purchase volume for the sampled products was 11% higher for the test group vs. the control group. “Nobody has been able to quantify repeat purchasing quite this way before,” says Stermer. “This gives us the tools and the foundation for determining the lifetime value of a customer that extends far beyond day-of-event lift.”
Average cumulative trial for the sampled items was 58% higher
The study reported that in-store sampling can drive trial (which is defined as first-time purchase of the product) over time. The average cumulative trial for the sampled items was 58% higher — a full 20 weeks after the event — for the test households than for the control households. “The critical information here is the ‘long tail’ effect and how things occur over time,” says Kent. “We’re looking at 20 weeks out, and we still see a 58% sales bump for the test group over the control group. Sure, this reinforces the known positive effects of sampling on the day of the event, but more importantly, it demonstrates that sampling drives sales, in trial, over a much longer haul… 20 weeks, at least. Having that kind of sales impact that long after the day of event makes sampling incredibly cost effective. This is really big news. And until this study, nobody was really sure how that worked.”
Sampling Sees Lift 20 Weeks Out
Sampling Sees Lift 20 Weeks Out. Loyalty-card research finds that in-store sampling boosts sales long after the event, lifts established products, and increases basket size.
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