Multiplied

The weekly shop isn't shrinking. It's being taken apart. New Zealand's supermarket duopoly still holds more than 80% of the market, and that number isn't moving. But underneath it, the trip is fragmenting: a planned main shop, a string of top-ups, and a growing pile of delivered baskets. Online grocery is now the single largest online spending category in the country. Every one of those fragments is winnable by someone who isn't a supermarket. That's exactly the ground convenience retailers are best placed to take. We map where the weekly shop is coming apart, and who's best positioned to pick up the pieces. Full report here: https://lnkd.in/e5FARbSm

Most retailers are still competing for share of wallet. The real fight in 2026 is for share of trip. As a commerce agency, watching how people choose where to shop, fuel up, and spend their attention isn't a side interest for us, it's the job. We spent months studying what's changing across New Zealand retail and landed on five things that separate the retailers who'll win the next five years from the ones who won't. We unpack all five, with the New Zealand data behind them, in our new report.

New Zealand's fuel retailers have split into two camps, and the middle ground is disappearing. One camp strips the visit down to the transaction: unstaffed pumps, cut prices, minimal service. The other rebuilds the forecourt as a destination: good coffee, food worth a detour, EV charging that buys 20 minutes of a captive customer petrol never gave anyone. Both strategies can work. What's failing is the middle: a staffed site charging more than the discounter down the road, with no food offer worth crossing town for. Our new report covers both camps, the economics behind each, and what the winners are doing differently. Read the full report: https://lnkd.in/e5FARbSm

The underdeveloped opportunity in New Zealand goes beyond grocery. Forecourts and convenience stores attract high-frequency visits from customers who are out of the house, in a vehicle, and often minutes from making a purchase. As loyalty programmes and apps increasingly connect those customers to their transactions, fuel and convenience retailers have the foundations of a powerful retail media network with a unique advantage: reaching people mid-journey, not just mid-shop. Retailers with the strongest customer data and audiences will capture a growing share of supplier marketing investment, rewarding those who invest early in identity, data infrastructure, and closed-loop measurement.

The weekly shop isn't shrinking. It's being taken apart. New Zealand's supermarket duopoly still holds more than 80% of the market, and that number isn't moving. But underneath it, the trip is fragmenting: a planned main shop, a string of top-ups, and a growing pile of delivered baskets. Online grocery is now the single largest online spending category in the country. Every one of those fragments is winnable by someone who isn't a supermarket. That's exactly the ground convenience retailers are best placed to take. We map where the weekly shop is coming apart, and who's best positioned to pick up the pieces.

The customer who used to arrive automatically is gone. For decades, New Zealand retail didn't have to earn its traffic. The gas tank ran low. The fridge ran empty. The walk home passed the shop window. All of it delivered customers before a single ad ran. That default is breaking down, fastest in convenience. Around 1 in 5 Kiwi petrol stations is now unstaffed. Electric and hybrid vehicles took a record, 38.2% of new car registrations in June. The reason to stop at a forecourt is changing, and in some cases disappearing. As a commerce agency, this is the shift we spend our days working on, so we put six months of thinking into one report: what's changing across New Zealand retail, and what earning the visit actually takes.