Will Customers Return to Stop & Shop?

Take it to the bank. Stop & Shop customers will return.

I started noticing them about 5-6 days into the 10-day strike. I'd read angry comments from people on Facebook threads about the Stop & Shop strike. They claimed to be shut out Stop & Shop customers, and their patience was wearing thin. They were starting to threaten using their only weapon in this Game of Thrones: the threat of taking their wallets elsewhere. After news broke last night that an agreement has been reached, it remains to be seen how many and how quickly the customers will return.

My prediction is that the vast majority of Stop & Shop customers will return to their pre-strike shopping habits. Were customers inconvenienced during the strike? Absolutely. Did the employees at some SouthCoast Stop & Shop locations handle the strike better than others? Yes. There were multiple reports of some unfortunate incidents at different Stop & Shops.

However, I would submit that people have very short memories when it comes to these things. There is no way that a significant amount of people are going to inconvenience themselves for very long as a matter of principal.

I would offer that by the time the summer months are in full swing, it'll be as if there was never a strike at Stop & Shop. There will be zero lasting effects.