We mostly bought these goods

The shopping pattern over the past year shows that we buy completely ordinary food from the store.

TV 2 has obtained figures from Rema 1000, Coop Extra and Norgesgruppen. The latter consists of stores such as Kiwi, Meny, Joker and Spar.

Both at Coop and Norgesgruppen there is one product in particular that repeats itself in the top ten list.

Do you recognize yourself in the list?

– Although there is a decline in consumption, milk is well represented on these lists. It is gratifying, says Alexander Schjøll.

He is a researcher on food and personal finance at SIFO at Oslo Met.

Preliminary figures from the Information Office for Dairy Products show a decrease in milk consumption in 2022.

See the full list further down in the text.

Snacks at Rema 1000

Schjøll thinks the list shows funny numbers.

– Some goods are repeated in all three chains. It shows a fairly similar trading pattern, he says to TV 2.

The food scientist points out that the list mostly does not consist of many healthy items. Snacks top the list at Rema 1000.

– It can’t be any fun for Rema that bulk sweets top sales. Rema seems to be the least healthy grocery chain, especially because there is both beer and tobacco on the list, says Schjøll.

Rema 1000 says they do a lot for health and wellness, and it is important to look at the product groups as a whole, and not just individual products.

– We know that customers choose to shop with us because it is fresh. We have a varied selection and the small goodies shelf is perceived as clean and tidy, says communications advisor at Rema 1000, Celine Anette Sjøberg.

EMV boom

The record price increase contributed to the food chains noticing a startling trend in recent months. TV 2 has previously written about the grocery chains registering an increase in sales of the stores’ own brands (EMV):

• Extra’s Xtra series increased by 35 per cent in the past year.
• Rema 1000’s own brands increased by three percentage points in the past year.
• KIWI will not provide any specific figures, but states that their customers choose the cheapest option to a greater extent.

This can also be seen in the list of the most sold goods at the grocery chains.

– It is exciting to see that own brands are doing quite well here. All the lists contain such products, which reflects the EMV growth we have seen in recent years, says Schjøll.

This year, the grocery chains have reported that customers have become more aware of what they put in their shopping basket due to increased food prices.

– When it comes to what happens next year, I would like to believe that the items on these lists are so central to the Norwegian diet that even a more difficult economic situation will not change that much.

– It may be that EMV variants will come in more strongly, but I probably don’t think so, says Schjøll.