VietNamNet Bridge – More and more urbanites are frequenting shopping malls, supermarkets and convenience stores, but traditional markets remain even more popular among consumers, a survey has found.

The survey, conducted by the Hanoi National Economics University, showed that 70 percent of polled consumers, while shopping at supermarkets, pay primary attention to the quality of products, then to the service style and service quality.

Product quality and service modernization are their top priorities, and Vietnamese consumers are willing to pay high prices to buy higher-quality products and enjoy better services.

However, the survey also found that consumers who buy goods at supermarkets are usually higher-income residents. Fifty percent of them are office workers and civil service employees, while 40 percent are housewives and 10 percent are window-shoppers.

Only 20 percent of goods are distributed through modern retail channels, where analysts believe there is great potential.

The survey on trade infrastructure in Hanoi, conducted by the Hanoi Socio-Economic Development Research Institute, pointed out that though modern retail channels have become more popular, they had remained uncompetitive with traditional markets.

The survey showed that 87.1 percent of polled consumers said they usually go to traditional markets when they want to buy goods. They said they wanted the markets to continue to exist.

Nearly 70 per cent of those surveyed said they were satisfied with the number of existing traditional markets, while 21.4 percent said traditional markets were “acceptable”, and only 12.7 percent said they found the markets “necessary” but “unsatisfactory”.

When asked about minimarts, 60.7 percent of polled consumers said they were satisfied  about their existence and services by minimarts and convenience stores.

Meanwhile,12 percent said they were unsatisfied, mostly because of undiversified products available and the higher prices of products at minimarts than at traditional markets.

Only 37.4 percent said they patronized supermarkets regularly, and 45.8 percent of them said they were “satisfactory”.

Meanwhile, up to 61.2 percent of consumers do not choose supermarkets as the regular shopping channel, while 38.4 percent do not feel satisfied when shopping there.

The overcrowding at supermarkets and shopping malls, and bad infrastructure, including transport conditions and parking lot, were reasons for their dissatisfaction.

An analyst noted that the survey results were not a surprise at all, saying that traditional markets remained the choice of housewives as they can provide fresh food, not frozen food, and they sell products at lower prices than supermarkets.

Dr. Dinh Thi My Loan, chair of the Vietnamese Association of Retailers (VAR), noted that modern retail channels only accounted for a very small market share in Vietnam if compared with other regional markets.

She noted that most retailers were facing problems in human resources, lacking salespeople, accountants and collectors, and mid- and high-ranking managers. Only 3.1 percent of the personnel was trained in retail management in 2013.

Kim Chi