Highly Commended Award to Article on Consumer Logistics

Johan Hagberg’s och Daniel Normark’s article ”From basket to shopping bag – Retailers role in the transformation of consumer mobility in Sweden, 1941-1970” have won the prize Highly Commended Award from Emerald Publishing.

The article analyzes changes in consumer logistics, i.e. how consumers transport their goods to their home, in the context of the emergence of self-service in food stores. The article is based on a study of ICA-Tidningen (a retailers magazine) during the period 1941-1970. The researchers present several factors that effected the development and argues that it is important to study the connection between commerce and consumption and pay extra close attention to small changes.

Some important changes during the period were:

• Switch from manual service to self-service in the stores. The cart made it possible to move over larger areas, making possible larger stores with more products.
• The introduction of the shopping bag facilitated impulse-purchases by removing the need to plan purchases to fit basket or bags brought from home.
• Cars and bikes made it possible to travel longer distances to shop, aswell as shop in several different stores making the personal relationship with the store owner less important.

The study is part of the project Consumer Logistics, financed by Formas.