[Aqwis]

> On average, customers go to physical grocery stores 3.2 times per month

This seems crazy to me -- not only must be purchases be enormous, but fresh meats and vegetables don't keep for 9 days between each visit. Am I missing something?

[kelnos]

That doesn't sound that weird to me. Two things:

I expect most people aren't shy about buying several weeks worth of meat and freezing it. Quality doesn't drop off that much. Quality differences are more noticeable with frozen vegetables, but I suspect a lot of people are fine with those too. Then there are frozen microwave/oven dinners and things like that, as well as non-perishable/shelf-stable items.

A household that exclusively cooks all their meals might make 7-10 grocery trips per month, but I expect that most people don't do that, and even those who cook all their meals probably don't rely on fresh meat & veggies for every single meal. And note that they don't cover people who go out to eat at restaurants at all in that list, so they're not accounted for anywhere.

On a side note, regarding your surprise at the purchases being large: most Americans, especially those who live in rural or suburban areas, don't do the kind of daily or near-daily stops at small convenience stores to pick up a few quick things that you see in dense cities. They drive to the grocery store, load up as much as they can fit in their cart, fill up their car, and go back home.

[bayonetz]

On the frozen meat point, I'd bet large sums of money people can't distinguish between fresh and frozen-within-3-or-so-months meat. In fact, frozen meat can be reliably made even tastier than fresh if you cook it straight fron the freezer with no thaw. It's a cool little hack really. By cooking from frozen you get more time to sear, char, and crisp the outside of the meat while the inside doesn't overcook. It's next to impossible to get the right mix of seared/charred outside but tender lightly cooked inside with the normal thickness stock cuts (~1inch) you get at grocery stores. With frozen, can do it no problem everytime. On that note, another trick, if you must cook without freezing, is to just get a custom thickness cut. For example, I need a 2-3inch NY strip if I want to grill straight from the refrigerator and get the right outside to inside done-ness.

[noir_lord]

> Quality differences are more noticeable with frozen vegetables.

Heavily depends on the vegetables, frozen peas often taste way better than ones bought from the local market (not always but often) and come without the time taken to shell them, same with things like carrots etc.

The price difference is pretty insignificant when factored against the convenience (for me at least).

[gumby]

>> On average, customers go to physical grocery stores 3.2 times per month

> This seems crazy to me

It read to me as poor use of statistics (as in the statement that the average human has slightly more than one ovary and slightly less than one testicle). Some don't go at all and do no food prep, some are not primary shopper she in household but stop by occasionally on way home to fetch forgotten item, etc. Plus all surveyed order in!

[erikpukinskis]

My Mom used to buy groceries every two weeks.

You eat the perishable stuff the first week, and the less perishable stuff the second week. Strawberries on day 1, oranges on day 13. Fresh bread on day 4, homemade biscuits on day 12. String beans on day 6, cabbage on day 11.

One of the nice benefits is you really work through everything by the end of week 2, so you don't have random crap sitting in your fridge for a month.

[mrighele]

I used to make shopping once a week. Since some food doesn't last very long I would plan my meals according to the kind of food. For example on the shopping day I would usually eat fresh fish. Some meat would go to refrigetator for short term consumption, some to the freezer to be used later. Fruit and vegetables are more tricky, since in my opinion the lose a lot if you freeze them. You can though try to get less ripened fruits, in order to consume them in later days.

In any case, according to what my American friends told me, in their case most probably it is because they don't buy much fresh food at all.

[gozur88]

When I was growing up my mother did one major shopping trip a month. And she cooked every meal for the family - we never ate out.

We ate a lot of frozen meats and vegetables. Even bread stays fresh if you freeze it.

[in_cahoots]

Maybe visits are split among couples? As the average age in this dataset is 32, a significant chunk of the people must be partnered or married.

[DanBC]

The average consumer doesn't buy fresh produce, but buys things that are frozen or canned.

[danieltillett]

Exactly. This is telling us more what is being eaten and it isn't fresh produce.

[thisone]

I shop once a week out of habit and because it's when I refill my car (I could shop every two weeks now that I've found fresh milk that has a very long expiration), except for meat and veg.

I go to a gigantic butcher's shop once or twice a month, portion out the purchases and then freeze them.

I get a veg delivery once a week from a local farm who also locally sources what they don't grow.

[Rapzid]

Plenty of vegetables last 9+ days.