This phygital store combines best of online, offline shopping
IFIRST heard of COOP Fresh during the pandemic. Then, it was an online marketplace where young millennials and Gen Z got their vegetables, fruits, meat, and coffee. Finally, COOP Fresh opened its first brick-andmortar store at BGC in January 2022. I have been wanting to see it but living in Fairview made that difficult.
On Tuesday, I had to attend a beauty event and I asked my friend Olivia Estrada, who is a COOP expert of sorts, to take me there. What makes COOP Fresh unique in the Philippines is that it’s cashless. Your purchases are rung up on the computer and you pay using your preferred method. I used a debit card and I imagine they accept credit cards and other cashless options such as Maya and Gcash.
By the way, the COOP Fresh store is also very Instagram-worthy and very Gen Z-friendly. For any boomer or millennial going there, be prepared to see influencers shooting content all over the store. It’s their world. We’re just sharing it.
Here’s the thing: COOP Fresh is known as a phygital store, which means that it provides the experience of going out to a physical grocery with the ease and convenience of online shopping.
When you visit the BGC store, you’ll see a mini supermarket setup where you can find snacks, milk and oatmilk, meat, deli meats and cheeses, bread and, of course, coffee. There’s also a coffee and milk bar.
The store carries products such as Coop-branded chips, drinks, pasta sauces, meat, and deli goods, as well as house-made gelato, bottled cocktails, and even plant-based ethyl alcohol. I tried the Cereal Milk Crack, which was made with Oatside, and it was good.
You can put your desired items into your grocery cart and approach any of the COOP staff to have your items scanned with their phone. Your bill goes to your COOP Fresh account and you can pay via online banking.
Of course, the COOP Fresh website is up and running and it’s still where a lot of people, including my friend Olivia, shop.
The store has a campaign, called #Adultingatcoop, which makes buying, preparing, or cooking food less intimidating. For instance, there an #Adultingatcoop sign in front of the beef tapa that explains how COOP Fresh’s beef tapa doesn’t have any preservatives like most commercially prepared ones.
For a person like me, buying food and cooking sounds simple enough even if I’m not really a great cook. But for Gen Z living alone for the first time in their lives, it can be very intimidating.
I read somewhere that COOP has a real-time inventory. The stocks you see in the store are those that you will find on the web site. They have one fulfilment center for Metro Manila. The quantity of the item you see on the website is accurate and you can say goodbye to days of the shopper calling you to inform you that the item you ordered is out of stock. When you order something, it is there.
Globally, consumers are embracing digital and interactive shopping, which is an offshoot of the pandemic.
For instance, Snap Inc. developed AR tools such as filters and lenses that allow consumers to interact with product catalogs and try on products virtually. By adding Snapchat QR codes to grocery packs, brand owners can also leverage physical products to create interactive digital experiences.
In China, KFC has fully phygital locations where consumers can place their orders on touchscreens upon entering the restaurant, and use facial recognition to complete payment.
According to Google, the pandemic has made people more flexible about whether they buy online or off. About 73 percent now describe themselves as channel agnostic, compared with 65 percent before Covid-19. But with things getting back to normal, people are going to stores again while not completely abandoning online shopping.
While the pandemic has accelerated digital adoption and online sales are growing, new research from Euromonitor found “it is expected that 78 percent of purchases will still be made in stores by 2024,” said Jason Spero in the Google report.
And here’s why I think phygital tores like COOP Fresh are doing it right. According to Spero, “People care about what’s in stock, and they want to know whether a store offers curbside pickup and when its doors open and close. Everyone needs reassurance that they’ll find what they’re looking for before they leave home.”
Phygital stores like COOP Fresh provide in-store and digital shopping with interactive experiences and this makes a difference for consumers who now expect more when they buy anything. ■