The employees of Nah & Frisch have been rated as the most friendly and committed in the food retail sector in Austria, according to a report in the business publication cash.at.
The survey, conducted by the market and opinion research firm, Marketagent, rated how friendly and committed Austria's food retail employees were.
Respondents rated Nah & Frisch as the supermarket with the best employees, followed by Adeg, Hofer, Unimarkt and Denn’s Biomarkt.
The survey comprised more than 21,000 online interviews, and involved the rating of employees from 11 industries.
Out of this, more than 6,075 interviews were related to the food retail trade, the report said.
Better Customer Relationships
According to the managing director of Marketagent, Thomas Schwabl, smaller shops have an advantage over larger ones as they automatically create a family atmosphere, which in turn helps in building better customer relationships.
He also added that urban and rural settings also have an impact on the relationship between retailers and customers as larger cities tend to be more anonymous.
The survey also found that although around nine out of ten customers described supermarket employees as being friendly (95%) and helpful (90%), only under six out of ten respondents rated food retail employees to be ‘very friendly’ (58%).
Lisa Patek, marketing manager at Marketagent feels that food retailing is yet to catch up with the industry.
“According to our survey participants, the nicest and most helpful employees can be found in the bakery, in the drugstore and the sports shop," the report quoted Patek.
The First Impression
Around 81% of the participants rated Nah & Frisch as the top retailer for successfully creating the first impression through personal greetings in its stores.
It was followed by Unimarkt, with 74% of respondents saying that they were welcomed personally by store employees.
Adeg emerged in third place with at least 2 out of 3 (66%) respondents saying they were personally greeted.
Other retailers that made it to the top five in this category include Metro and SPAR, the report said.
© 2020 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Dayeeta Das. Click subscribe to sign up to ESM: The European Supermarket Magazine.
