Surprise, Your Customers Are Also Wal-Mart’s.

Retailers who don’t think they share their customers with Wal-Mart just got some bad news according to a new analysis of cross shopping patterns by BIGresearch. The analysis, “When Customers Cross Shop,” was taken from BIGresearch’s December Consumer Intentions and Actions survey (CIA) of 7,712 consumers.

“The idea of customer loyalty, where consumers shop exclusively at a particular retail store, ceased to exist long ago,” said Gary Drenik of BIGresearch. “Today’s retail market is populated with the most knowledgeable shopper ever. Loyalty has been replaced by cross shopping. Your ‘customers’ are also your competitor’s customers,” said Drenik.

For example, 11.6 million consumers say they shop most often for women’s clothing at JC Penney. Unfortunately for JC Penney, 8 million of their best women’s clothing customers also shop most often at Wal-Mart for some other merchandise category. 69% of JC Penney’s best women’s clothing customers have a relationship with Wal-Mart and could be at risk particularly if Wal-Mart refines their apparel merchandise selection.

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