Reflections on Journeys within the Supermarket

Abstract

In this paper, we deconstruct the ethnographic process to examine how adopting a multifaceted approach impacted our interpretation of the findings. The original intention was to undertake (only) structured, observational research to consider a fairly standard marketing problem – why do consumers choose some grocery brands over others. However we soon realized that such a format was unsatisfactory. Instead we recognized the need to consider both the content and process of shopping to understand the complexity of behaviours reflected. The results suggest that many consumers’ lives are created around various realities and they use consumption to engage and experience these.