Consumer demand
Online grocery growth is separating from physical-store performance
Online food-and-beverage sales rose 15.5% while physical-store sales declined 2.8% in Circana’s latest period.
- Announcement
- Reported October 30, 2026
- Published
- November 2, 2026
- Reading time
- 3 min read
Why it matters
A brand can look soft at the shelf while demand is shifting online within the same account. Store velocity alone may no longer explain total retailer performance.
What changed
Circana data reported by Grocery Dive show online food-and-beverage sales rising 15.5% year over year during the four weeks ended October 4, while brick-and-mortar sales declined 2.8%.
Store-brand sales edged up during the period while national-brand sales declined about 1%. Circana also described shoppers as reducing waste, balancing price tiers and pack sizes, and buying more deliberately.
The divergence makes digital shelf execution, availability and retailer-specific online reporting increasingly important to account diagnosis.
Commercial read
What it changes for sellers
Account scorecards need two views
Separate physical and digital performance before deciding that an item, category or retailer is losing demand.
Digital availability is distribution
Search placement, substitutions, images, reviews and online in-stock rates can materially affect the sales a brand attributes to an account.
Value includes pack choice
Price tiers and pack sizes matter as shoppers reduce excess and make more deliberate purchases without necessarily trading away from quality.
Next move
What to do now
- 1
Build separate physical-store and e-commerce scorecards for priority accounts.
- 2
Audit online search, content, ratings, availability, substitutions and promotional effectiveness.
- 3
Test whether pack architecture—not only price—is limiting conversion in the account.
The sales figures cover a four-week national measurement period and are not specific to the natural channel or to an individual retailer.
Source trail