The Grocery Dive Outlook on 2021

Having closed the book on one of the most tumultuous years in recent memory, grocers are now looking ahead to a 2021 filled with opportunity and uncertainty. Although the novel coronavirus pandemic that hit the U.S. last March has delivered a sales windfall to food retailers, it's unclear how consumers will respond once their communities, offices and schools open back up and they can dine inside restaurants once more. It's also unclear when, exactly, that will all happen as COVID-19 vaccines haltingly roll out across the U.S.

If 2020 was about quickly responding to a public health disaster, the theme for 2021 promises to be strategically managing their gains for long-term growth, industry experts say. Instead of retooling their supply chains to keep pace with record demand, retailers will focus more on merchandising and securing customer loyalty. Instead of racing to add e-commerce servers and delivery drivers, grocers will zero in on efficiency and make online shopping a better experience.

Here are a few of the top trends that promise to shape the grocery industry in 2021.

E-commerce gets a lot more 'seamless'

The long-forecast online grocery boom happened all at once in 2020. Now, experts say, it's time for grocers to improve their platforms and also make online order fulfillment more efficient.

Pickup, which emerged as consumers' favored e-commerce mode, is especially ripe for improvements given the high demand and the low-tech approach many retailers still take, said Tom Furphy, CEO and managing director of Consumer Equity Partners, which invests in retail technology.​

“It’s a combination of ‘I’ve got products coming in and staged in the store in a way that’s more efficient’ and ‘I’ve got technology that allows them to pick through that more efficiently,’” he said.

Grocers are investing in order- and labor-management technology. They're also moving toward dedicated spaces, whether in-store pick areas or dark stores, that are optimized for order picking efficiency. Jordan Berke, a former e-commerce executive with Walmart China and founder of Tomorrow Retail Consulting, said he's advising grocers to stretch fulfillment capacity at stores by utilizing extra space and automation before pushing into a dark facility after that.

As retailers explore more mature fulfillment strategies, they’re finding it makes more sense to do the picking and order assembly themselves and push pricier operations like delivery over to third-party providers, Berke said. 

“The grocers are going to start to take over the picking because they know that is an area they have to be good at,” he said. “And when you're paying Instacart 10% of sales, when you could be picking it at 5% of sales ... you can't go forever at arbitrage.”

Bill Bishop, chief architect at Brick Meets Click, believes 2021 will be the year when "seamless integration of e-commerce" becomes a top priority for retailers. In addition to process improvements, he said grocers will implement more personalization technology and meal-planning tools that will make online shopping a more manageable — and perhaps even an enjoyable — experience.

The fight to retain meal dollars

Grocers got a major boost from consumers’ meal dollars when the pandemic stifled restaurants and spurred at-home cooking. But restaurants are going to grab many of those dollars back in 2021 as more people get vaccinated and communities reopen. 

"The grocers are going to want to hold onto as much of that as possible,” said Tory Gundelach, senior vice president of retail insights with Kantar Consulting.

To fuel the at-home cooking surge and combat meal prep fatigue in 2020, retailers turned to technology to make shopping and meal prep easier. Kroger launched an artificial intelligence-based digital tool that suggests recipes based on tweeted photos of food items, while Hy-Vee, H-E-B, Schnuck Markets and many others added fresh meals, including restaurant selections, to online ordering.

With a post-pandemic future in sight, grocers should consider offering meal kits for dinner and boosting breakfast options, Gundelach said. Target, for one, now carries HelloFresh and Local Crate meal kits along with fresh meal-in-a-bag deals. Retailers have also added new contactless services like smoothie-making machines and salad robots.

Grocers are banking on long-term shifts in culinary habits and work-from-home routines to fuel interest, and Gundelach said customers who cooked during the pandemic will likely continue to explore at-home culinary experiences even as people return to bars and restaurants. But retailers will have to invest in innovative merchandising and offerings to keep shoppers interested.

“I think we'll see grocers lean into things like food inspiration to keep shoppers wanting to cook at home,” Gundelach said. 

It’s showtime for Kroger

More than two years after announcing plans to build a network of robot-run fulfillment centers, Kroger and Ocado will begin opening those facilities in 2021, potentially giving the nation’s largest supermarket operator a leg up in handling the accelerated pace of e-commerce orders the industry is seeing.

The industry will be watching closely to see not only what's inside those voluminous customer fulfillment centers, but also how the companies will handle same-day delivery and pickup orders — two channels that have exploded since Kroger and Ocado first announced their tie-up. 

“They’ve had to spend a lot to get the point that they are currently in, but 2021 is the year when I think they start to reap the rewards from some of these things and we start to see the impact this kind of automation can have on the industry,” said Neil Saunders, managing director of GlobalData Retail.

Kroger has launched numerous other initiatives that will be closely watched, said Jason Goldberg, chief commerce strategy officer at Publicis, including its partnership with Walgreens, digital marketplace and ghost kitchen pilot.  

“Kroger is a special case, because they invested in a variety of things that are almost contradictory, and they’re not all going to pay off,” said Goldberg. “We don’t know if the future is going to be won by pickup from individual stores or if it’s going to be won by delivering groceries from a big fulfillment center, but the odds are if one of Kroger’s bets pays off really well, it’s going to be because the other one is less popular.”

Managing investor expectations after a boom year

Grocers grew accustomed to stellar sales growth as the pandemic drove customers to physical and online grocery channels at an unprecedented rate. But they will likely see those outsize gains, which have included triple-digit year-over-year increases in digital revenue, give way to more modest progress — or even negative results — if the nation is able to get the coronavirus under control during the coming year.

“That’s one of the key narratives that grocery stores will have to sell into Wall Street — explaining to them how the long-term trajectories of the businesses are actually very positive” even though the exceptional growth food retailers have been seeing is likely to subside, said Saunders. Investors “build certain expectations into their models … so we’re going to have to have a reset on those expectations.”

Goldberg said the fact that it will probably take months for the country to widely distribute COVID-19 vaccines will give grocers an opportunity to solidify connections with consumers, which could help them maintain at least some of the momentum that has made 2020 such a standout year.

“If anything, we’re probably more worried about comps and sales in 2022, because by then, hopefully, the health outlook will be a lot better and there’s likely to be a backlash where a lot of people are desperate to get back out to the restaurants," he said.

Loyalty programs evolve

Grocers have long discussed evolving their loyalty schemes beyond basic points-based programs. But 2020 appears to have finally tipped the scale as Amazon’s grocery stores — and with them, its sprawling Prime program — went up in markets around the country and Walmart unveiled its own premium loyalty program, Walmart+.

Paid membership programs promise to shore up customer loyalty as e-commerce makes it easy for shoppers to stray from their established grocers. Hy-Vee Plus includes a personal shopping service, free delivery and a dedicated customer help line. Grocers could also hold special events for members, give first access to new products and tie in discounts with other companies, said Gary Hawkins, a loyalty expert and CEO of the Center for Advancing Retail & Technology.

Membership dues aren’t necessary for grocers refreshing their loyalty programs, said Bishop with Brick Meets Click. Look for grocers to start offering unique perks tied to their brand identity, he said, pointing to Ohio’s Dorothy Lane Market, which emphasizes its local appeal by offering discounts at area businesses like dance studios and landscapers.

“Loyalty is no longer just discounts and points,” he said. “It's really a way to reach out of your customers, and then use whatever is unique in your personality as a brand.”

Health gets personalized

Many consumers tended closely to their health in 2020 as they watched a deadly virus sweep across the globe. That heightened awareness, coupled with advances in personalization technology, set the table for grocers to establish custom wellness programs that promise to fully integrate food shopping with personal health.

Grocers have long offered dietitian counseling and have boosted health marketing over the years. But personalized health promises to deliver tailored diet plans, product recommendations and help shoppers more easily navigate stores and online platforms. 

The movement reflects the growing focus on preventive medicine and the role food plays in that, with Kroger notably saying it plans to closely integrate its grocery selection with healthcare guidance and resources.

With health records increasingly going digital, Hawkins said retailers can potentially access more consumer health information than ever. They could also tap into information fed through wearable devices like the Apple Watch — all with shoppers’ permission, of course. In a recent paper, he highlighted Carnival Cruise Line's Ocean Medallion program, which uses personal information to, among other perks, alert restaurant staff to dietary preferences and allergies.

Amazon's breakout year in grocery

Amazon shows no signs of slowing its march in grocery after it spent last year introducing new store formats and improving its in-store and online shopping technology.

The e-commerce powerhouse debuted two new store formats, welcomed millions of new customers to its online grocery service and rolled out pickup to all Whole Foods stores. Grocers should expect Amazon to continue expanding its physical grocery footprint in 2021, with sources noting it has signed at least 100 leases so far for new Amazon Fresh locations. 

“I’m really nervous for the regionals because I think that 2021 is just going to be a crazy year for Amazon grocery,” Anne Mezzenga, co-CEO of retail blog Omni Talk, said. 

Mezzenga said she expects Amazon to take more of the slice of the Gen Z shoppers who care about convenience as more stores open. Meanwhile, Whole Foods, which already has an established customer history, will likely serve as a testing ground for new products, services and technology, she said. 

In addition to scaling and refining its grocery footprint, Mezzenga predicts Amazon will couple its grocery stores with healthcare hubs, continuing its recent foray into healthcare and the pharmacy business. “It is very realistic that they could put a healthcare hub in [an Amazon Fresh store] and if not a healthcare hub, maybe a pharmacy first and then doing minute clinics,” she said. 

More healthcare options integrated into physical retail could help Amazon in its growing competition with Walmart, which unveiled Walmart+ in September and plans to expand its own health centers. 

M&A comes out of hibernation

Grocers are likely to turn their focus to post-pandemic planning in 2021, shifting from reacting to virus-induced challenges to determining how to move forward on longer-term solutions in areas like e-commerce.

“No two retailers are taking the same approach yet acquisitions, the ‘buy’ side of the equation, will become even more attractive as struggling brands and retailers become desirable targets,” Carol Spieckerman, president of retail consulting firm Spieckerman Retail, wrote in an email.

In the years prior to the pandemic, acquisitions had been ramping up with larger grocers expanding their regional clout as smaller players cashed out. Booming sales promise to raise acquisition costs and keep struggling players afloat, and could mean more cross-industry deals like Albertsons' acquisition of Plated and H-E-B's acquisition of Favor. 

The rapid pace of e-commerce development in 2021 could lead to more deals like Ahold Delhaize's tie-up with FreshDirect. Retailers may also scoop up service providers that can give them a leg-up in key technologies. Spieckerman pointed out that Canada's Loblaws recently acquired technology and talent from digital marketing and analytics company Eyereturn Marketing, which promises to boost its in-house data capabilities and tech bench.

“Acqui-hiring” — acquiring a company to recruit employees — will likely continue as retailers compete more aggressively with technology companies for labor, Spieckerman said. 

As grocers scout for strategies to maintain the powerful sales momentum they've built during the coronavirus pandemic, pickup is emerging as a candidate that's especially ripe for innovation.

Consumers have embraced the click-and-collect concept at a breakneck pace during the past year. Albertsons recently reported that its Drive Up & Go offering grew 800% in the company’s latest quarter, and Target said its Drive Up service surged 500% during November and December.

But while surging channel demand presents an opportunity for retailers to strengthen their ties with shoppers and bring in added revenue, it also poses challenges as store owners look for the physical space and labor they need to support their booming online businesses, according to e-commerce experts. 

"For retailers, every square foot matters. They don’t necessarily have a lot of excess space," said Jeremy Neren, co-founder and CEO of GrocerKey, which provides e-commerce technology to grocers including Woodman's Market, an 18-store chain that operates stores in Illinois and Wisconsin. "So as e-commerce becomes a bigger percentage of sales, it becomes a real issue of where are we going to store this product and where are we going to stage it from the time we take [an order] till the customer comes into the store comes to pick it up."

Retailers looking to counter those obstacles are experimenting with ways to make pickup more efficient, in terms of both square footage and customer convenience. At the intersection of both points sit order storage units, both automated and non-automated, which have undergone testing by grocers in recent years and are gaining renewed interest as companies seek new ways to meet booming e-commerce demand.

In October, Albertsons announced that it intended to test lockers at selected Jewel-Osco stores in Chicago and Safeway locations in the San Francisco Bay Area. The temperature-controlled units, made by North Carolina-based Bell and Howell, are designed to preserve hot and cold items after store staff have finished assembling orders. Shoppers can choose when they intend to pick up their goods when placing an order online.

Albertsons is also trying out more sophisticated storage systems. In Chicago, technology integrator Telaid recently installed an automated pickup kiosk outside a Jewel-Osco store.

The unit, which is made by Estonian technology firm Cleveron and features regular and deep-freeze sections, routes items to a central pickup space built into the unit. Customers select a two-hour pickup time frame in advance and, upon arrival, request their order by scanning a code displayed on a smartphone. Albertsons plans to place another such kiosk at a San Francisco-area Safeway at a later point, according to the company.

Other retailers that operate pickup lockers include Amazon and Home Depot. Home improvement retailer Lowe's said in September that it plans to install lockers chainwide by the end of March. Walmart, meanwhile, has tested automated grocery pickup terminals in the past and has Cleveron-made pickup towers at hundreds of stores. 

A key advantage offered by pickup lockers and automated kiosks is that they can add convenience for consumers by eliminating the need to wait while a store worker gets their order, said David Bishop, partner with e-commerce consultancy Brick Meets Click. The units also allow stores to deploy workers more efficiently by removing the need to assign staff to bring orders to customers when they arrive, he said.

"The lockers provide an opportunity to say, 'We're going to shift the retrieval process from the store being required to bring it out to the customer,'" Bishop said.

Pickup lockers and kiosks can also be placed away from stores, at points closer to where shoppers work and live. Retailers have experimented with off-site placement in the past, with Hy-Vee leasing its Aisles Online pickup lockers and Peapod installing pickup lockers at Washington, D.C., Metro stations. And pandemic-driven demand could spur a renewal of these efforts. In Europe, retailers like Carrefour and E. Leclerc have built standalone pickup spots in suburbs as well as cities.

Beyond streamlining the pickup process, lockers could improve the customer experience by allowing grocers to efficiently fulfill center-store orders for customers during or even before they peruse the store perimeter for items like produce and meat that shoppers often like to choose on their own, said David Gottlieb, managing director of the Americas for Trax, a provider of computer vision and analytics solutions to retailers.

"Imagine I've got a list of basics that I know I'm going to get every week. I walk into the store, I pick all my fresh items, and I come back to the register to pay, and grab my three bags that have been [set aside in a locker]. I think that could make a lot of sense," Gottlieb said.

Even as they promise convenience, however, lockers can introduce unintended headaches.

For example, consumers who prefer to have their groceries brought to their vehicle might balk at being asked to park and walk over to a locker — a factor that could limit the appeal of storage units and, by extension, the benefits they offer grocers, Bishop said.

"If we reduce the wait time to effectively zero by shifting the responsibility onto the customer, then how does the customer perceive the fact that they now have to get out of their car, go over to the locker, retrieve their packages and put them into the car themself?"

Another obstacle is that the units have a finite amount of space, meaning that some items might be too large or unwieldy to fit properly, he said. 

Aside from the physical limitations, retailers who choose to use lockers and automated kiosks also have to devise strategies for ensuring their reliability, Neren said.

"It becomes a very complicated supply chain, logistics and space-management issue," Neren said. "I do think … we’ll see more of them as retailers are going to be doing a lot more of everything to solve for all the various issues associated with e-commerce. But I still think there is a little more work that needs to be done to solve for the complexities of grocery."

Retailers are also looking to storage units to enhance delivery service. Walmart, for example, plans to test temperature-controlled boxes that can store delivery orders outside homes with selected customers in Bentonville, Arkansas, later this year. Like lockers and kiosks used for pickup, the boxes Walmart is evaluating are designed to provide flexibility by removing the need for workers and customers to interact.

But they also come with restrictions. As with lockers, a central problem the units pose is their limited size, which could put delivery drivers in the uncomfortable position of having to find a way to squeeze a customer's order into a space that can't comfortably accommodate it, Bishop said.

"You can't fault the driver, because they're being told you've got to do this, and you can't fault the customer because the customer's trying to take advantage of your service," Bishop said. "Ultimately, then, if the customer [receives goods that have] damage and can quickly see that the solution isn't delivering against the promise, then the value proposition evaporates."

Starting a new business can be hard enough, but grocery owners that opened shop last year faced the usual industry challenges coupled with the health and safety risks and supply chain headaches caused by the novel coronavirus pandemic.

Despite the pandemic-induced disruption, entrepreneurs around the U.S. still ventured into the grocery industry with its traditionally low margins to respond to the opportunities they saw in their local communities. 

Grocery Dive spoke to owners of three independent grocery stores around the U.S. to find out what it was like opening during the chaos of 2020, how the pandemic has impacted their businesses and what they have their sights set on for 2021. 

Elroy's Fine Foods in Monterey, California

Jay and Chloé Dolata always knew they wanted to open a grocery store after frequent trips to Papa Joe’s Gourmet Market in Michigan while dating. A little over a decade later, their dream came to fruition with the opening of Elroy's Fine Foods in Monterey, California, in August.

The couple started looking for a grocery store space after deciding in late 2007 to move to California and, in the meantime, owned a counter-serve cafe in nearby Carmel-by-the-Sea for 11 years. In 2019, they found the right spot: the storefront of a former supermarket two blocks away from a Whole Foods Market. 

The Dolatas took inspiration from Erewhon Market, a luxury supermarket chain in the Los Angeles area. Chloé Dolata said Elroy’s urban feel appeals to the newcomers to the Monterey Peninsula who fled cities like San Francisco due to the pandemic. With its “wild yellow” paint and mid-century roofline, Elroy’s aims to appeal to value-oriented shoppers with its “overall feeling of fresh and beautiful and thoughtful,” she said.

The lower shelves make the store “feel open and friendly,” while the organic produce department is designed to “feel more like a farmers market,” she said. The organic bulk department boasts being just the second one in the U.S. to have entirely glass and stainless-steel bins. The store’s showpiece is an $85,000 stainless steel, wood-fired grill: “It’s just so much fun. People just stop and watch the food being cooked on it."

During the summer, Elroy’s had outdoor seating in a side alley with artificial turf, picnic tables and cafe lights. Chloé Dolata said she's looking forward to offering indoor seating at the bar, which offers beer, wine, coffee, lattes, smoothies, bowls and pastries.

The store places an emphasis on supplier diversity. “We love to support any sort of business that is either smaller or minority-owned or BIPOC-owned or female-owned or family-owned,” Chloé Dolata said. Working with a local farmer, they created a distribution system that allows for drop-offs at nearby farmers markets — consolidating deliveries while still getting produce the day it’s picked to the store.

Chloé Dolata said shoppers are putting pressure on major retailers to offer products from smaller and mission-driven companies. “We've seen the larger grocery chains adapt and become more organic and kind of follow those trends, because it's been demanded of them,” she said.

Customers also want e-commerce — an offering the Dolatas have faced some delays rolling out. Because the store’s e-commerce site is about 80% done and not yet live, Elroy’s provides FaceTime shopping appointments and delivery through a local bicycle delivery service or from the Dolatas themselves. “The [e-commerce] peak is now,” Chloé Dolata said. “It kills me that we're missing a lot of it, but you know, that's life.” 

For 2021, top priorities at Elroy's include getting e-commerce ramped up and having the human resources department create a plan to help employees get vaccinated against COVID-19. Looking further ahead, the Dolatas plan to open two or three more stores within the next 10 years. As the business grows, she wants to implement open-book finance, and eventually, would like to offer profit-sharing.  

Post-pandemic, the Dolatas envision offering free samples, hosting in-store events like apple tastings with local farmers and possibly even creating "Singles Night in the Produce Department" so people can get to know each other at their local gourmet market — just like Chloé and Jay Dolata did. 

Black Market in Louisville, Kentucky 

When a Kroger store in Louisville's West End neighborhood temporarily closed last June during protests over the police killing of David McAtee, a Black local barbecue restaurant owner, Shauntrice Martin knew she needed to help address food insecurity in the area.

Martin kicked off a community food justice initiative aimed at helping the local community “until the West End neighborhood had a Black-Owned and sustainable fresh food source for our residents,” the campaign page noted. The goal became reality when Martin held the soft opening for her grocery store on Black Friday, Nov. 27.

With Black Market, Martin is working to tackle several community needs at once: access to “real, healthy food,” support for Black-owned businesses and Black farmers and more job opportunities for locals. The store aims to have 90% of its products sourced from Black-owned businesses and Black farmers, she said.  

Martin, who studied food apartheids across the globe and U.S., said her passion for tackling food insecurity stems from not having a grocery store within walking distance of the Louisville housing project she grew up in. “You had to take one or two buses to the closest Kroger, and then it was never really stocked well,” Martin said. “And I just remember growing up, my mother would rent a car just to go get groceries for everybody else in the neighborhood.”

In Louisville, roughly 120,100 people, including one in six children, face food insecurity, according to the Community Foundation of Louisville. 

The store revamped a former Domino’s Pizza site that had been vacant for more than 10 years: “It's been a real eyesore in the community because people just dump their trash.” Now, the space is refreshed but only about a dozen shoppers are allowed inside a small area of the store due to safety protocols prompted by the pandemic. Because Black Market hasn’t been approved for the SNAP and WIC programs yet, Martin said it’s giving out groceries for free to people who ask if the store accepts EBT and WIC benefits. 

Curbside pickup and deliveries are a big part of the business. Online shoppers can buy grocery bundles costing $30, $60 or $80 along with branded apparel. “It helps families to spend less time worrying about all sorts of things that you can order online, pick up or order online and have it delivered to you,” Martin said about the bundles.

Martin said her main priority for 2021 is to boost the pay and professional development opportunities for her workers: part-time fellows who “live in or are from the West End” that are guaranteed a job for one year. Currently, Black Market's five fellows work 25 hours per week for $10 per hour, although Martin would like to increase their pay to between $15 and $25 an hour by this time next year. 

“They are all given the position of assistant manager with the choice to move on to manager whenever they feel ready,” Martin said. “We have courses that they're allowed to take for free, and if they do any of the training, that's paid.”

Martin, who works as an organizer for Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, an advocacy group, is forgoing a salary for the grocery store’s first year, and instead using it to help cover transportation and childcare costs and caregiver stipends for the contract workers. She’s also part of an effort to open a grocery co-op in Louisville and is continuing to run the food justice initiative, with the goal of feeding 200,000 people.

“The point is to get food out,” Martin said. “I don't know if it's going to make a profit … As long as we can pay people a living wage, as long as we can give out groceries to people who need it, I really don't care about if it makes money.”

Mason & Greens in Alexandria, Virginia

Justin and Anna Marino didn’t realize they would need to put their digital skills to work so quickly when their zero-waste grocery store debuted right as COVID-19 restrictions swept the U.S. last March. 

Justin, who has a background in information technology and cybersecurity consulting, and Anna, who was a hairdresser for 10 years and ran her own Etsy shop, built a website that offers ship-to-home service along with store pickup and local delivery within 3 miles of the store. 

“We didn't have our cleaning protocols in place and everything that we needed to make sure that it was safe for customers,” Justin Marino said. “We ended up launching the website a little bit sooner and that’s good because it kind of forced us down that road.”

The inspiration for Mason & Greens stemmed from their struggles with in-store and online grocery shopping to fit their vegan and plastic- and trash-free lifestyle. In 2019, they started planning their own store, snagging a prized rental spot along the main street in Alexandria just two blocks from where they live. 

In late March, right around when Virginia’s governor announced a stay-at-home order, Mason & Greens opened as a dark store. The Marinos say it's the first zero-waste, sustainable dry goods and grocery store in the Washington, D.C., area.

In May, the store started offering appointment-only shopping, and by June, it was fully open to the public. The 1,200-square-foot store has three rooms: one with zero-waste products like shampoo, soaps, toys, housewares and bulk cleaners; a second with produce, grocery and bulk food products; and a third with baked goods and on-draft wine and beer for people who bring in their own containers. 

Forgoing plastic has posed some challenges to zero-waste shopping during the pandemic, but the Marinos have found solutions. For the bakery items, which the Marinos wanted to be self-serve prior to the pandemic, store associates are picking them for customers instead of wrapping them in plastic for customers to grab, as many grocers have done.

The Marinos are offering paper bags to shoppers who don’t bring their own containers, and instead of sharing scoops for bulk items, each customer gets their own scoop. Workers are consistently sanitizing the store, the Marinos said.

"We hold cleanliness at a pretty high standard, and we needed to, whether we opened up during COVID or not, because, generally, [when] people think 'bulk shops,' they think 'dirty,'" Anna Marino said.  

Many suppliers, especially the small ones, Mason & Greens works with have been receptive to the sustainability efforts and eliminating plastic use. “We do require [farmers and distributors] to also maintain the sort of ideals that we have, which is we don't want extra packaging. We don't want something plastic,” he noted. “That's hard in the food industry."

The Marinos have found that their store is “appealing to different crowds.” When it first opened, about 80% of the customers subscribed to a zero-waste lifestyle, while now, it’s more of an even split, Justin Marino estimated. More importantly, the shoppers are coming back: 60%-70% are repeat customers, he said. 

In addition to local shoppers, Mason & Greens has customers from as far away as California and Massachusetts, the Marinos said. “We did actually plan on [e-commerce] being a good revenue stream for us because it allowed us to reach out a little bit to folks who are not in the immediate area,” Justin Marino said, noting that the zero-waste community is “pretty tightly knit.”

While the website traffic dropped last spring after a booming opening, the Marinos are confident e-commerce will grow their business. In addition to continuing to leverage their online presence, they want to establish more relationships with local farmers and, once safe, host store events and other opportunities to boost community engagement. Currently, they are looking for the right spot to open a store in D.C. before the end of the year.