The holiday season is a critical time for convenience stores, with unique shopping patterns emerging during key days like Thanksgiving and Christmas. At Vroom Delivery, we’ve been closely monitoring these trends and how online ordering patterns evolve over these days. Here’s what we’ve learned: 

Thanksgiving Eve: Feeding Families with Fast To-Go Foodservice

Thanksgiving Eve is a bustling day for convenience stores, driven largely by first-party online orders. This year, foodservice took center stage, comprising 39% of the total order volume. Customers prioritized dinner items, with pizzas and other ready-to-eat meals being top choices. Tobacco and nicotine products came in second, accounting for 25% of the volume, underscoring their perennial importance in convenience store sales.

The dynamic of heavy foodservice and average order value (AOV) of over $44 highlight the value and high-margin potential of first-party orders. These transactions often involve regular foodservice customers who are critical to boosting overall profitability.

Thanksgiving Day: Limited Retail Options for Last-Minute Grocery Needs

Thanksgiving Day brought a notable shift in customer behavior. Foodservice categories through first-party ordering channels saw a pullback of 31% due to families cooking at home. However, this decline was more than offset by a surge in marketplace orders from platforms like DoorDash and UberEats. Beverages, in particular, experienced a significant 70% increase in their proportional share of sales this year.

While marketplace orders typically pick up later in the night, on Thanksgiving we actually saw them peak around 7pm which is likely due to grocery store closures, leaving customers scrambling for last-minute items such as sodas and snacks. Convenience stores with a strong presence on third-party platforms—particularly those that can leverage retail-optimized menus such as DoorDash Retail UI that properly indexes CPG items and can handle thousands of SKUs—are uniquely positioned to capture this demand.

The Power of Complementary Services

These insights underscore the value of maintaining both first-party and third-party ordering channels. Each serves different customer segments and demand profiles, helping to smooth out sales fluctuations overtime.

• First-party ordering drives high-volume, high-margin transactions, largely fueled by foodservice and age restricted offerings. It attracts regular customers and builds loyalty, offering retailers a chance to cultivate long-term value (LTV).
• Marketplace ordering complements this by bringing in new customers, especially on days when traditional shopping patterns shift. Retailers can leverage these interactions to convert marketplace customers into loyal first-party users.

Strategies for Success

1. Optimize Foodservice for First-Party Channels: Ensure your menu and foodservice capabilities are robust to capitalize on the high-margin opportunities of first-party orders.
2. Leverage Marketplace Platforms: Use third-party delivery services to capture incremental sales during low periods for first-party ordering, especially on holidays when many other businesses are closed.
3. Convert Marketplace Customers: Focus on building brand awareness through marketplace orders, ensuring your store's strengths and offerings are clear to encourage customers to explore your proprietary ordering channels.
4. Adapt Inventory to Demand: Stock up on beverages, snacks, and other high-demand items for Thanksgiving Day, especially for evening sales.

By offering complementary services and adapting to the unique demands of the holiday season, convenience stores can maximize their sales potential and build a stronger customer base. The key lies in understanding these patterns and strategically leveraging the tools at your disposal to meet customer needs when it matters most.

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