Recent research has found that one in three Britons prefers to shop with local vendors, saving £287.64 per year.
A survey by Vouchercloud asked 2,316 Britons about their shopping habits, revealing that 32% of Britons prefer to shop with smaller businesses than large retailers, with 49% of respondents shopping with local vendors ‘at least once per week‘.
‘Better value for money‘, ‘keeping local traders in business‘ and ‘less queues‘ top the list of reasons why Britons are turning to local vendors.
The latest figures show that, on average, consumers spend £45.38 with local vendors per month, for which they think the same shop would cost them £69.35 in a supermarket – a saving of £23.97 per month, or £287.64 per year.
Fruit, vegetables, meat and dairy topped the list of products that consumers were most likely to purchase locally, followed by flowers, bread, cakes, desserts and handmade items.
Chris Johnson, Head of Operations at Vouchercloud.com, said: “It‘s great to see that Britons are choosing to shop with local vendors and businesses for items that they could purchase within supermarkets and national retailers. Not only are they making a financial saving per shop, but they‘re also helping to keep a small, local business alive, which in turn is helping the local economy.”
He added: “Many of us don‘t realise that we have such great local businesses on our doorsteps until it‘s too late and the business has gone under. Often, we‘d rather choose a lifestyle where we can purchase everything under one roof, but that‘s not necessarily the cheapest way to go and we‘re clocking on to this. It‘s becoming a regular habit for many of us to visit a number of different shops in order to get the best deals available to us. It may cost us slightly more in petrol or public transport costs, but in the long run we‘re saving so much more.”
Charlie Brown
