One thing that I have noticed when I go to any grocery store is that people, (including me) sometimes decide to buy certain brands based on how many products are on the shelf. For example, when I went into the grocery store yesterday, I noticed that there were many people in the candy aisle (which makes sense because it’s almost Halloween). I observed these people for a few minutes and I noticed someone who picked up a bag of candy and considered it, while looking over to the candy nearby that was almost sold out. After thinking about for a couple of seconds they put the candy down that they were holding and decided to purchase the other one instead. The two bags of candy were around the same price, but the fact that one type of candy was almost sold out might imply that it is a better brand of candy. I didn’t even realize that I did the exact same thing when I was buying vegetable oil. I picked up the Crisco because that was what I was used to getting, but then I noticed that a lot more people had been purchasing Wesson. They were almost the exact same price, and I never thought about the possibility of the Crisco having been restocked. I just noticed that there was less Wesson on the shelves than Crisco, and I automatically thought “this must be the one that’s more popular.”
I agree with you. When looking at the shelf to see how many items are left, we are making an estimation of likelihood that short shelf life does equal popularity. Even though this may not be true, we still continue to buy the item. It amazes me that we still buy these products even though we know this may not be the real reason why there are fewer items. We are also relying on our reference group. Those who were buying the Halloween candy were relying on others, their reference group at this time, to see what they were buying by how many bags were left on the shelf.
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