When food shopping, the focus is on quality and increasingly on price

In choosing food products, the country of origin is the most important criterion for only four percent of Czechs. Quality is the most important measure for 44 percent, and price for 34 percent. Nonetheless, the importance of price has been growing again because of economic uncertainty. These results follow from the recent study carried out by the advisory firm KPMG Czech Republic.

For 13 percent of the respondents, the food products’ ingredients and their structure are the most important criteria. Two percent look at the producer of a product first, and three percent choose the food products they purchase according to other criteria.

“In a previous study, carried out in 2019, the share of respondents who see price as the most important criterion in choosing food products dropped to under 30 percent for the second time in a row. This time, however, the share of price as the most important criterion rose again to 34 percent, which is a return to 2013 numbers. The reason for this change is most likely the economic uncertainty connected with the COVID-19 pandemic and the current high inflation. Unless the uncertainty declines, people’s emphasis on price will probably increase even more”, says Martina Štegová, KPMG Partner in charge of Retail. As Martina Štegová adds, price is naturally the most important criterion with low-income customers.

In 2017, during an economic boom period, 28 percent of respondents indicated price as the most important criterion when buying food products, which was the lowest percentage over the entire monitored period from 2013 to today. 

Primarily due to growing food prices, approx. one in eleven customers (9 percent) on average spends more than CZK 4,000 on food products per month, while 20 percent of the respondents spend CZK 3,000 to CZK 4,000. Thirty-two-and-a-half percent of Czechs spend up to CZK 2,000 on food.

“Costs for food products have grown sharply. In 2013, total expenses on food exceeded CZK 3,000 per month for only 6 percent of the respondents. In 2019, the share of this category rose to 16 percent and in 2021 to 29 percent. Simultaneously, the share of those who spend up to CZK 2,000 logically continues to decrease”, says Martina Štegová. “Food represents a basic need and cannot be replaced by anything else. If households spend an ever-larger share of their income on food products, they naturally have less money for other spending, e.g., on various services”, Martina Štegová adds.

The 2021 Retail Trends study was carried out in November, with 1,000 respondents representing a representative population sample both in terms of age, place of residence, education, and income. The most recent previous data on this topic was published by KPMG Czech Republic in May 2019.