SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82

https://doi.org/10.1007/s43546-023-00453-0

REVIEW

Changes in shopping habits during COVID‑19

Eda Helin Gündeş1 · Füsun Ülengin1 · Burç Ülengin2 · Ömer Zeybek3

Received: 26 August 2022 / Accepted: 5 February 2023 / Published online: 27 February 2023
© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023

Abstract
By the start of 2020, the daily and business world had to undergo a radical change
with the widespread pandemic known as COVID-19. Many people had to replace
their everyday purchase medium to meet the enforced restrictions, and local busi-
nesses had to adjust their operations to accommodate the negative impacts brought
upon by the disease’s rapid spread. Groceries and FMCG sub-sectors of the retail
industry were forced to adapt to consumers’ stockpiling and panic-buying behaviors.
We studied the impact of similar purchase attitudes for various product groups dur-
ing the COVID-19 and probed the differences between sales of online and physical
markets. Initially, a cluster analysis identifies which product groups were affected
by similar shopping behaviors during the pandemic. Subsequently, the impact of the
number of COVID cases on sales levels was measured using stepwise, lasso, and the
best subset models. All the models were applied to both physical and online market
datasets. The results showed a significant shift from the physical to the online mar-
kets during the pandemic. These findings can provide an essential guideline to retail
managers in adapting to the new world.

Keywords COVID-19 · Consumer behavior · Retailing · Hierarchical cluster

analysis · Regression

Introduction

On the 31st of December 2019, the Wuhan local government warned the World
Health Organization (WHO) that the cause of an outbreak of a new virus in Hubei
remained unclear. COVID-19 has influenced every aspect of daily life. Masks

* Füsun Ülengin
fulengin@sabanciuniv.edu
1
Faculty of Management, Sabanci University, Istanbul, Turkey
2
Faculty of Management–Management Engineering Department, Istanbul Technical University,
Istanbul, Turkey
3
Migros Ticaret AŞ. R&D Department, Innovative Data Analytics and Ad-Hoc Research,
Istanbul, Turkey

Vol.:(0123456789)
82 Page 2 of 24 SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82

have become necessary as people learned to be more conscientious about per-

sonal hygiene. Rules and regulations, such as curfews and lockdowns, travel
restrictions, and social distancing measures, were implemented in various coun-
tries to help the population cope with the pandemic in the most effective way
possible. Since the first news of the outbreak in China, world economies have
been impacted. Thus, it obligated companies to identify the potential dangers that
might arise if they cannot run their supply chains during the crisis (Saenz et al.
2020). As a result, businesses began to concentrate on making their supply chain
distribution more resilient than ever before.
The pandemic affected both the supply and demand sides of all industries. The
retail industry was no exception. It was one of the most affected sectors (TÜİK.
2023). Limitations imposed by governments led to panic buying of consumers,
which left the market mainly unprepared. Due to panic buying and the surge of
delivery issues on the manufacturers’ end, store shelves remained empty for sev-
eral days (Hall et al. 2020). During this period, the preference for online shopping
grew. Although most markets already had an infrastructure for online shopping,
supply and logistics issues rendered the capacity of both the online and physi-
cal stores insufficient to meet rapidly increasing demand. Especially, the online
channels of many supermarket chains require 3 to 4 days of the delivery time to
deliver the customers’ orders (Islam et al. 2021).
To better understand the impact of the pandemic during this period, this
research aims to analyze the effect of COVID-19 on the consumer behavior in the
retail industry. For this purpose, this study focuses on answering the following
questions:

1. Which product groups were affected by similar purchase attitudes during the
COVID-19 pandemic?
2. Compared to 2019, which product groups were affected by a significant change
in shopping behavior during the pandemic?
3. Are there any differences between the online market and physical store sales levels
during the pandemic and in 2019? Is there a shift from physical to online markets?

This case study investigates the sales data of Migros, one of Turkey’s larg-
est supermarket chains, for the 2019–2020. The supermarket chain provides its
service with a total of 2,370 stores spread over 81 provinces in Turkey and holds
over 2000 varieties of product groups and brands. In addition to perishable and
food-related groups, glassware, textile, toys, and electronic products are also pro-
vided. According to official figures for the year 2020, the retailer’s sales volume
increased by 24% YoY.
The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. The “Literature review”
provides a literature review based on the effect of the pandemic in general, its
impact on supply chain disruption and consumer behavior, and the research con-
ducted to analyze the effects of COVID-19, in particular on consumer shopping
behavior, and the contribution of the paper is underlined. The “Proposed method-
ology” provides the proposed methodology. “Discussion of the results” presents
SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82 Page 3 of 24 82

the analysis of the Turkish retailer as a case study, and the “Discussion of the
results” discusses the findings. Finally, the “Conclusion and further suggestions”
is based on conclusions and further suggestions.

Literature review

The effect of pandemic in general

The Justinian Plague of the 6th Century and the Bubonic plague of the 14th Cen-
tury were the first global pandemics that spread through trade routes. Although
these outbreaks caused substantial trade disruption, it was impossible to observe
the supply chain and consumption relations during medieval times and assess
their effects on the economy and trade-related industries. On the other hand,
the first global health crisis observed in the modern age was the Spanish Flu of
1918–1920. However, during this pandemic, the supply chain and consumption
side were already heavily distressed due to World War I.
The effect of flu outbreaks from 1950 to 2008 remained confined to Asia. How-
ever, in 2009, the Avian Flu (H1N1) pandemic became the first global outbreak
spread across different continents. More importantly, this outbreak was the first
pandemic that directly impacted the global economy and was interconnected to the
information age. Early studies on the potential macroeconomic effects of the world-
wide pandemic were published a few years before the start of the H1N1 pandemic.
In a working paper submitted to the European Commission (Jonung and Roeger
2006), an empirical model-based approach was utilized to simulate the effects of a
possible pandemic on the European economy. Under the assumption of an epidemic
hitting Europe in 2006, the authors suggested that a disturbance in supply due to
social distancing would cause a 1.6% contraction in the European economy. More-
over, Buetre et al. (Buetre et al. 2006) examined the same situation for Australia
and estimated that its regional economy would curtail by 6.8% in the wake of the
Avian Flu endemic. Finally, (Keogh-Brown et al. 2010) probed the effect of a major
epidemic scenario using the UK Economic and Social Research Council’s quar-
terly Macro-Economic Model and estimated at least a 2.52% and at most a 6.05%
decrease in UK’s GDP with consumption impact.
In addition to these scenario-based simulation studies, a new research stream
that blends data-driven studies with epidemiology disciplines came into existence
in the early 2000s. One of the topics explored by the researchers in this discipline
is assessing the impact of the health crisis while employing internet search data.
The first studies based on the search trends came from the community healthcare
field. Eysenbach (2006) suggested a relationship between the 2004 flu epidem-
ics in Canada and Google searches well before the “Google Trends” service was
launched and became publicly available. Consequently, Ginsberg et al. (2009)
became the first publication in the area of info-demiology to employ Google
Trends data to examine epidemic trends.
82 Page 4 of 24 SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82

The effect of pandemic on supply chain disruption

Understanding the changes in shopping habits and consumer behavior requires

us to investigate the initial disruption caused by the pandemic that occurred in
the supply chain. Disturbances in the supply chain, which start with the producer
and end with the consumer, also affect the final step in the process, which is the
customer purchasing and consuming the product. COVID-19 highlighted the
inefficiency of all industries in reacting to large-scale disruptions promptly. The
importance of resilience was highlighted as various industries still build more
adaptability towards unanticipated situations, such as the Covid-19 pandemic.
Resilience is defined as the ability to resist disruptions and recover performance.
Supply chains mostly affected by the lack of resilience mainly include the life
sciences, health care, and food industries (Simchi-Levi and Simchi-Levi 2020).
COVID-19 also led enterprises to transition toward more sustainable supply
chains. Most companies in these industries needed to implement new sustainabil-
ity strategies, such as building community trust, faster than they had expected.
In return, including these strategies could aid companies in building their supply
chain resilience. Risk response and crisis management techniques allow compa-
nies to transform themselves through sustainability by helping them reduce risks
and strengthen resilience (Sarkis 2020).
In fact, during the crisis period, supply chains were divided into two groups.
Some were faced with an extreme demand they could not meet, while others
experienced a severe decrease in demand and supply, prompting them to halt pro-
duction. Many companies dealt with the danger of bankruptcy and did not get
any governmental support during this time (Ivanov 2020). The food industry was
among the sectors that flourished the most with the sudden increase in demand.
Most consumer goods were no longer as easily accessible as before. Demand for
food continues to increase even if people have sufficient supplies because of the
extreme financial conditions. If supply chains continue to be disrupted, further
shortages in the food industry will be expected (Sarkis et al. 2020). Supply chains
are susceptible to disruptions caused by disasters. Depending on the level of pre-
paredness, the effect of disturbances may even last for several cycles.
Along with disruptions caused by disasters, stockpiling creates a more com-
plex environment for inventory management. When restocking becomes a prob-
lem and companies cannot meet the demand, people become more eager to look
for substitute products. This behavior affects the whole structure and creates
double-sided problems for both the retailer and the consumer. Several manifesta-
tions of this behavior were observed in the UK and Australia at the beginning of
the pandemic. For example, when people could not find toilet paper, they bought
baby nappies and kitchen towels even though they are not usually considered sub-
stitutes for one another (Chen et al. 2020).
SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82 Page 5 of 24 82

The effect of pandemic on consumer behavior

The commodity theory claims that scarcity may explain stockpiling behavior
(Brock 1968), which arises as an individual’s response to stress, fear, and a panic-
inducing environment. People started to purchase or order more than their average
consumption and stocked them in cases of an emergency (Micalizzi et al. 2021).
According to the prospect theory, risk aversion motivates this behavior if food
sources are perceived to be scarce by the consumer, even though the possibility
of this happening is very low (Tversky and Kahneman 1992). As a result, this
behavior cannot be considered entirely irrational because it reflects human nature.
However, stockpiling has serious adverse effects on the economy and society. As
a social behavior, it negatively affects supply chains by disrupting them and creat-
ing shortages (Micalizzi et al. 2021).
Apart from disruptions in the supply chain, panic buying also affects social life
by creating a chaotic environment and a scarcity of goods for others. This condi-
tion applies mainly to the elderly, disabled, and working-class people since they
cannot shop at their convenience and are much more affected by the chaos caused
by panic buying. When a product becomes scarce, its value also starts to increase.
Another adverse effect of stockpiling is that it creates a competitive environ-
ment that leads to price increases (Chen et al. 2020). Empty shelves, intermittent
restocking problems, and the chaos from panic buying led people to shop online.
Most retailers were not ready to respond to the increased demand in online mar-
kets, which resulted in delayed deliveries that lasted for 3–4 days. Late deliv-
eries in online markets, empty shelves in local stores, and increasing prices led
people to spend more money during this period. Consumers who could not find
the product they were looking for had to go farther away to see what they were
seeking (Chen et al. 2020). One of the recent studies in this field also examined
the changing purchasing behaviors in the United States during the COVID-19
pandemic. The authors used data gathered from a survey conducted in 2021 and
utilized logistics regression to derive their results. They highlighted that the con-
cerns about health and financial issues influence the change in shopping behavior
(Truong and Truong 2022).
Supply chains are looking for more permanent solutions for these impending
threats. On the other hand, governments are working on preventing panic-buying
behavior in case of future disasters. Online market options are continuously increas-
ing. Many retailers started to launch their online applications, which allow consum-
ers to place their orders more conveniently. They strive to provide more product
options than physical stores by establishing warehouses dedicated solely to online
orders and circumventing the shelf capacity constraints. In reality, online shopping,
especially grocery shopping, was a broadly discussed topic among researchers even
before the pandemic. Many papers on this subject have focused on its driving fac-
tors and changing trends (Chen et al. 2020). Retailers should focus on changing
consumer behavior and the customer experience and adoption process (Hand et al.
2009). In the online adoption of the consumers, there is also the issue of consumer
perception and behavior concerning single versus multi-brand retailers (Rahnamaee
and Berger 2013).
82 Page 6 of 24 SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82

Several studies have shown that people’s adoption rate of online grocery shopping
is deliberate and slow. While online shopping consumers make decisions based on
their habits (Frank and Peschel 2020), the trust and recommendations from friends
and family play a significant role in their shopping and adoption decisions. (Pauzi
et al. 2017) and (Hand et al. 2009) showed that lifestyle changes, such as relocating
to a new house, having children or newborns, taking care of the elderly at home,
working late, and changing jobs, are driving factors behind online shopping (Hand
et al. 2009). However, one study comparing several countries showed that Turkish
citizens find online shopping less satisfying, even if the internet makes purchasing
consumer goods effortless and cheaper. This is mainly a result of Turkey’s insuf-
ficient technology infrastructure (Turan 2012). Another reason why Turkish citizens
find online grocery shopping less satisfactory is that those who opt for shopping
from local stores are usually skeptical about product quality because it is not accu-
rately reflected in online markets (Muhammad et al. 2016). Household Information
and Communication Usage Survey (ICT) of 2021 (Turkish Statistical Institute 2021)
shows that computer and internet usage in Turkey is at 61.7% and 48.1%, respec-
tively, for those aged between 25–34 and 35–44. Overall, 92% of homes have access
to the internet, and 96% of individuals own cell phones. However, the same sur-
vey points out that the percentage of individuals who do online shopping is only
44.3%. All those types of research related to the above-given consumer retail behav-
ior changes during crisis periods such as the pandemic necessitates appropriate data
collection, integration and aggregation and the use of suitable business analytics
models (Petrescu and Krishen 2020).

The effect of COVID‑19 on shopping behavior

Although the COVID-19 pandemic has well affected many aspects of the majority
of people, the academic research analyzing its impact on consumer behavior and
shopping habits are tenuous. In March 2020, shopping habits and consumer behav-
ior began to change. The retail industry experienced a shock in the online market
and the orders increased. As the number of infected cases rose, people avoided
shopping in person, which resulted in a rapid increase in online orders, compelling
retailers to focus more on their online services. As this was the case for past natu-
ral disasters and crises, panic buying, stock-pilling, and hoarding became rampant
worldwide. Shelves of local stores were emptied out by people stockpiling their
daily used and necessary items, such as food, medicine, and toilet paper (Chen et al.
2020), (Park et al. 2020). Soares et al. (2022) analyze the impact of COVID-19 on
online shopping behavior of 1052 Brazilian online consumers. They used PLS-SEM
and revealed that the perceived risk of being infected by the pandemic making in-
person shopping positively influenced the perceived usefulness and ease of online
purchases. However, the proposed model is solely based on data collected during
winter where important mobility restrictions influence the online buying decisions
and should be repeated to see the purchasing behavior changes that will occur at dif-
ferent stages of the pandemic.
SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82 Page 7 of 24 82

Szymkowiak et al. (2021) adopted structural equation modeling on answers

to 914 questions to analyze the relation between the risk of in-store infection and
consumer behavior. They showed that customers had decreased pleasure during
shopping due to the risk. In addition, their approach measured how the pandemic
influenced the behavioral response of customers within a store and provided rec-
ommendations for stationary retailers to become more resilient. However, since the
study was conducted during the pandemic, the results could not be compared with
pre-COVID periods.
(Chiu et al. 2022) also emphasized the change in consumer behavior during the
pandemic. They collected 608 responses from USA consumers and employed a par-
tial least square structural equation model on the data. They concluded that COVID-
19 increased the consumers’ fear and, in turn, led to a surge in the purchase of online
fitness products. However, based on their results, the income level of the customers
had a negative influence on the relationship between fear and online purchase of
the products, as mentioned earlier. Their study provides a guideline for sports retail-
ers in preparing strategies for different customer segments. However, as was the
case with Szymkowiak et al. (2021) paper, this study could not compare its results
with the pre-COVID period. In addition, the analysis does not provide insight into
changes in the consumer behavior of other frequently purchased products, such as
those sold in the superstores.
Boyle et al. (2022) analyzed the impact of COVID-19 on grocery shopper behav-
ior. They used transactional data and market basket analysis with different indicators
to shed light on consumption and prioritization changes. However, their focus on a
single store limits the representativeness of the study’s results.
Sohn et al. (2022) studied consumer purchasing behavior, specifically turning
their attention toward purchasing organic food. Their collected data includes periods
before the COVID-19 and during the first wave of the pandemic from 429 German
consumers. They analyzed the data using structural equation modeling and deduced
that although the pandemic increased consumers’ quality and health consciousness
and consequently motivated them to buy organic products, it did not influence their
environmental consciousness. They also demonstrated that the results portray differ-
ences between customer characteristics, such as income, age, and education. How-
ever, the scope of this study is limited to organic products, and it only considers and
analyzes the information from the first wave of the pandemic.
Table 1 provides a summary of a comparison of this paper’s proposed methodol-
ogy with the current literature.
As can be seen from the table, the research which analyzes the impact of COVID-
19 on shopping behavior are either limited to a specific type of products or investi-
gates only the COVID-19 period and, thus, does not provide a comparison concern-
ing the pre-COVID period.
The primary contribution of this paper is to analyze the sales data for both physi-
cal and online stores of one of the biggest supermarkets in Turkey and to evalu-
ate the changing consumer behavior of customers in Turkey during the COVID-19
pandemic by comparing pre-COVID period. As a case study, the data of one of the
biggest supermarket chains in Turkey are gathered, cleansed, and analyzed using a
CRISP-DM methodology.

Table 1  Comparison of our proposed methodology with the literature
Author Aim of the paper
Soares et al. (2022) Impact of COVID-19 on online
shopping behavior
Szymkowiak et al. (2021) The relation between the risk of
in-store infection and consumer
behavior
Chiu et al. (2022) Change in consumer behavior dur-
ing the pandemic
Boyle et al. (2022) The impact of COVID-19 on gro-
cery shopper behavior
Sohn et al. (2022) Consumer purchasing behavior
The differences are shown with “-”
Data/methods Results
1052 online consumers Pandemic has positive impact on
PLS-SEM online shopping
914 questions Customers had decreased pleasure
PLS-SEM during shopping due to the risk
608 responses COVID-19 increased the consum-
PLS-SEM ers’ fear and, in turn, led to a
surge in the purchase of online
fitness products
Transactional data Consumption and prioritization
Market Basket Analysis change
Periods prior and during Pandemic increased consum-
the first wave of the ers’ health consciousness and
pandemic motivated them to buy organic
429 German consumers products
PLS-SEM
82 Page 8 of 24
Differences with this paper
(-)Based on data collected during
winter
(-)Based on data only during the
pandemic
(-)Could not compare its results with
the pre-COVID period
(-)Only online fitness products
(-)Focus on a single store
(-)Limited to organic products
(-)First wave of the pandemic
SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82
SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82 Page 9 of 24 82

Proposed methodology

This research investigates changes that occurred in different product groups’ sales
before and during COVID-19, based on data from a Turkish retailer. The dataset
contains the sales levels of the product categories from January 2019 to Decem-
ber 2020. To explore the proposed research questions—which product groups were
affected by similar purchase attitudes, which affects significantly changed shopping
behavior, and are there any differences in sales levels between the online and physi-
cal stores during the pandemic in 2019—we utilized the Cross-Industry Standard
Process for Data Mining (CRISP-DM) methodology as the main approach (Shearer
2000). The steps in this methodology are business understanding, data understand-
ing, data preparation, modeling, evaluation of the models, and deployment (Provost
and Fawcett 2013).
To answer the questions given in the introduction, initially, a business under-
standing and data cleaning activities are realized based on several meetings with
the executives of the supermarket chain, subsequently, a hierarchical cluster analysis
is conducted to specify which groups of products were showing similar shopping
behavior. At the next stage, for each cluster, Stepwise, Lasso and the Best-Fit regres-
sion models are conducted, and the best-performing method to estimate the sale lev-
els for each product group in both the physical and online market is selected. Finally,
we can derive the transitions in shopping behavior in terms of product groups and
study the level at which their attitudes shifted. By examining the impact of COVID-
19 on these changes, we provide suggestions on policies that can be adopted to
help retailers better adapt to the new world. Figure 1 provides the flowchart of the
methodology.

Consumer data

The discussed methodology is applied to one of the largest supermarket chains in

Turkey. Datasets used for the case study contain the daily transactional records with
unit prices and quantities sold for all product groups from 01 January 2019 to the
end of 31 December 2020, with more than 5 million rows for each month. Both
online transaction and physical transaction data with the same timeline were used
to see the difference between the physical market and the online market. Since unit
prices change regardless of the spread of COVID-19, this research focuses on the
changes in the sold quantities. Covid case numbers starting from March 2020 to
the end of December 2020, since the first Covid-19 case was first seen in March in

Stepwise
Business Regression Evaluation &
Hierarchical
Understanding and Choosing the best
Cluster Analysis Lasso Regression
Data Cleaning model
Best Subset Model

Fig. 1  Flowchart of the methodology

82 Page 10 of 24 SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82

Turkey, were also used in the following analysis to examine the relationship between
sales and case numbers.

Analysis

Business understanding and data cleaning

As seen in Fig. 3, curfews, several restrictions, and procedures were implemented as

of April 2020, which resulted in a substantial paradigm change in the Turkish Retail
Sector. Some of the restrictions in the workplace for both employees and custom-
ers were mandatory use of masks, social distancing, a limited amount of person per
store, and regular disinfection of stores (Ministry of Health 2021; Wikimedia Foun-
dation 2022).
Survey-based retail sector indicators, such as Consumer Confidence and Retail
Trade Confidence, contracted in the first month of the pandemic, and both of them
dipped in April. However, they both recovered quickly in the first months of the
summer of 2020. As can be seen from Fig. 2, the negative effect of acceleration in
the trend of inflation in 2021 was more evident.
Initially, we filtered out the unrelated product groups to focus on the essential
consumable goods for both online and physical market datasets. For this purpose,
nine meetings were conducted with the data provider retail company’s Business
Intelligence (BI) Team. After cleaning the data, 30 out of 72 main product groups
were kept; however, since selling alcoholic beverages and tobacco products through
online channels is illegal in Turkey, these two groups were also excluded from our
analysis, and only the remaining 28 groups were used in the final comparison.

Fig. 2  Retail indicators of turkey

SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82 Page 11 of 24 82

Fig. 3  Dendrogram results for the products showing similar sales patterns

Cluster analysis results

For the second stage of our methodology, we perform Hierarchical Clustering to

cluster the product groups according to the similarities between their individual
sales trends from 2019 to 2020. The clustering was done in SPSS Statistics software.
For each of the six stores’ formats, the monthly YoY change in sales from 2019 to
2020 is revealed for the 30 main groups.
The results from cluster analysis using a complete linkage with a threshold of
10 yielded six clusters where two of them consist of only one group of products.
Accordingly, the retailer’s BI team also validated these findings by pointing out
that these two categories follow their characteristic trend apart from other product
groups in the retailer’s inventory.
The cluster analysis results are depicted in Fig. 3.
Each cluster name represents the product groups in each cluster (Table 2).
 82 Page 12 of 24

Table 2  Cluster results based on the similarities of sales patterns

Alcoholic beverages Daily needs Protein-based products Basic consumption goods Cold-chain products Electronics

Alcoholic beverages Seasonal products Meat-Deli Chips and snacks Meat Electronics
Glassware Olive oil and butters Dairy products Packaged meat
Textile Cheese Imported fruit Produce (vegetables and fruits)
Tobacco House care products Eggs Frozen goods
Cookies, chocolate, and candy Poultry Canned goods, beverages, and
breakfast food products
Bread and baked goods Fish and seafood Grains, pasta, and sides
Non-alcoholic beverages Paper and baby products
Take outs Cleaning products
Toys, pet care, and media Beauty products
SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82
SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82 Page 13 of 24 82

Fig. 4  Cluster’s percentage change compared to 2019

For the physical market, there was a significant decrease in April 2020 (Panel
A of Fig. 4). Soon after the number of cases per day exceeded 5000 on the 10th of
April 2020, the Ministry of Interior Affairs started to impose curfews. As a result,
people began to spend more time at home, leading them to prepare their meals them-
selves. This habit resulted in a decrease in sales levels for this cluster of products in
physical stores. However, the decrease in physical channels led to increased online
sales. While many people started to cook at home, others preferred to place orders
for their daily needs through online channels.
Items in this Protein-Based Products cluster (portrayed in Panel B of Fig. 4)
mainly consist of fish, meat, and dairy products. For products in the protein-based
cluster, it can be seen that sales levels were increased due to the imposition of
curfews.
Grains, pasta, sides, paper and baby products, and cleaning supplies were among
the groups in the Basic Consumption Goods cluster that had the most purchase and
consumption due to the spread of COVID-19, which led to panic buying. As a result,
many retailers needed help to meet the demand for these products during this period
(Panel C of Fig. 4). Instead of the product groups mentioned above, online market
consumers mainly preferred “Chips and Snacks” during this period.
The sale of cold-chain products (Panel D of Fig. 4) stayed at normal levels from
March 2020 to early June 2020, when the normalization period began in Turkey.
During this period, sales levels decreased, suggesting that people started to cook
less at home and dine outside more. However, when curfews were again imposed in
82 Page 14 of 24 SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82

September, people began to spend more on these products. The online market also
showed the same trends as the physical market. For the online market, clustering
indicated that shopping behavior related to this product group was similar to that of
the physical market. That is why the same cluster groups are also used for the online
market.
For physical and online markets, a graph was created for each cluster to show
different shopping habits from 2019 to 2020 (Fig. 4).

Regression analysis results

For the third stage, Stepwise, Lasso and Best Subset Regression models with sales
values aggregated at the described cluster levels were used to evaluate the effect
of the COVID-19 pandemic on the sales levels of each cluster. Using time series
models, we aimed to analyze whether the number of COVID-19 cases affected
the sales levels of a specific cluster group and, if so, how strong its impact is and
for which clusters. The variables found that could explain the sales levels in the
regression analysis are given in Table 3.
7
∑ ( ) ∑
Ln(Salesj )t = 𝛽0 + 𝛽1 Ln(Covid case number)t + 𝛼i Ln Salesj t−i + 𝛿k Zkt + 𝜖jt .
i=1 k=1
(1)
As can be seen from Table 3, a logarithmic transformation was applied for all
the variables since the numbers of infected cases and product sale levels were
not distributed normally. The model also included dummy variables for the 24th,
25th, and 26th of May and the 1st of June. These variables were added since a
significant change in sales levels occurred in those days. To capture the dynamic
interaction effects, in addition to level dummies, the interaction of LnCluster(A)
and dummy variables representing unusual sales behavior were multiplied in the
following columns to determine the difference on that day compared to 1–7 days
prior.
This process was applied to both the online and physical market datasets.
For the Stepwise regression, the “olsrr” (Hebbali 2020), and for the Lasso and
Best subset models, “glmnet” (Friedman et al. 2010) and “leaps” (Lumley 2020)

Table 3  Variables that have been used in regression analysis

DATE Starting from March 2020 until the end of December 2020
LNCASENUM Natural logarithm of case numbers
LNCLUSTER(A) Natural logarithm of total sales numbers for each cluster
LNCLUSTER(A_1-7) Values of each cluster (each of which were lagged 1 to 7 times in 7 different
columns)
DUM24_5 Dummy variable for the 24th of May because there was a curfew
DUM1_6 Dummy variable for the 1st of June because it was the start of the normalization
period
SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82 Page 15 of 24 82

packages offered in the R-Studio were utilized. The best estimation model was
selected based on Cp, Adjusted R2 values, F, and t values, as well as the tenfold
cross-validation test error rate (Gareth et al. 2013). The interpretation of these
findings was used to propose a road map for the retailer to revise its business
strategy in the face of the changing shopping behavior of consumers.

Physical market shopping regression analysis results for each cluster

As was mentioned before, three different regression models—Stepwise, Lasso, and

Best subset—were used for each of the six clusters for both the physical and online
market. Among these models, we selected the best-fitted model according to its
adjusted R2, Cp, and using tenfold cross-validation for each cluster. The results are
summarized in Table 4.
As can be seen from Table 4, the model with the lowest test error rate is the best
subset selection for all clusters except Electronics. The R-squared value is greater
than the other models, suggesting a better explanation of variation in the dataset.
Furthermore, the CV test error value is smaller, and the R-squared and Cp values
are higher for this model than the other, making the best-performing model the best
subset selection model.
For the Electronics product group, the lowest test error rate is given by the Lasso
regression model. However, its R-squared value is also slightly lower than the other
models. When we compare the three models’ t values to the Lasso’s, the outcome
was more statistically significant than the others. As a result, the Lasso model was
chosen as the final model for the Electronics product group because having a signifi-
cantly lower value of CV test error rate than other models.

Online market shopping regression analysis results for each cluster

The findings for online shopping are provided in the same form as used for the phys-
ical market. More specifically, the developed regression models and evaluation crite-
ria are identical for the online market. However, since there is no data for “Alcoholic
Beverages” in the online channels, it was excluded from the results.
The Best subset model has the highest R-squared, lowest CV test error, and high-
est Cp value among other models for each cluster, thus, making the best-performing
model for each cluster the Best subset model. Table 5 summarizes the results.

Discussion of the results

The main aim of the research was to compare the impact of the COVID-19 pan-
demic on the sales levels of different product groups in both online and physical
markets. The coefficient of the variable representing the number of infected cases
mainly tells how a 1% change in the number of COVID-19 cases affects the sales
levels as a percentage. By looking at Table 6, it can be inferred that a 1% increase
 82 Page 16 of 24

Table 4  Physical market regression results for each cluster

Cluster R-squared Cp Cv test error
Stepwise Lasso Best subset Stepwise Lasso Best subset Stepwise Lasso Best subset

Alcoholic beverages 0.825 0.824 0.826 11 10 12 2.317 2.108 0.944

Daily needs 0.728 0.713 0.735 10 6 8.31 0.215 0.19 0.142
Protein-based products 0.772 0.738 0.773 10 6 8.31 0.215 0.19 0.142
Basic consumption goods 0.753 0.726 0.753 10 7 8.24 0.184 0.167 0.128
Cold-chain products 0.764 0.729 0.764 10 7 8.27 0.207 0.179 0.135
Electronics 0.666 0.664 0.673 7 7 12 0.199 0.162 0.165
SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82
 SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82

Table 5  Online market regression results for each cluster

Cluster R-Squared Cp Cv test error
Stepwise Lasso Best subset Stepwise Lasso Best subset Stepwise Lasso Best subset

Daily needs 0.886 0.883 0.886 10 7 12 0.495 0.264 0.171

Protein-based products 0.886 0.844 0.867 10 7 12 0.440 0.251 0.188
Basic consumption goods 0.870 0.776 0.870 10 7 10.04 0.608 0.358 0.210
Cold-chain products 0.870 0.865 0.882 10 7 10.30 0.410 0.225 0.177
Electronics 0.656 0.654 0.656 8 10 10 0.489 0.540 0.409
Page 17 of 24 82
82 Page 18 of 24 SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82

Table 6  Example of regression Variable Coefficient Std. error t values p values

results
Intercept 7.111703 0.980449 7.254 3.80e-12 ***
LnCaseNum − 0.038233 0.012847 − 2.976 0.003168 **
LnClust4_1 0.266468 0.41211 6.466 4.32e-10 ***
LnClust4_2 − 0.184126 0.043141 − 4.268 2.68e-05 ***
LnClust4_3 − 0.006281 0.043976 − 0.143 0.886520
LnClust4_4 0.102171 0.044541 2.294 0.022520 *
LnClust4_5 − 0.183306 0.045945 − 3.990 8.40e-05 ***
LnClust4_6 0.157594 0.046314 3.403 0.000762 ***
LnClust4_7 0.38103 0.038052 10.068 < 2e-16 ***
Dum24_5 − 4.200313 0.238334 − 17.624 < 2e-16 ***
Dum1_6 2.994115 0.423527 7.069 1.19e-11 ***

in the number of cases leads to a 0.38% decrease in sales in the long run. Subse-
quently, if the number of cases increases by 10%, the sales of the relevant category
will decrease by approximately 4% in the long run. LnClust4_1 to LnClust4_7 rep-
resent the lagged days with respect to the original day sales. However, besides the
example cluster provided in Table 6, none of the other clusters, physical and online,
showed any significance of time effect on sales. That is why the further analysis was
only continued considering the COVID case numbers. Table 6 provides an example
of the final model results of how the research examined the effect of the COVID-19
pandemic on sales.

The impact of the number of COVID‑19 cases on each cluster in the physical
market

Table 7 illustrates the number of COVID-19 cases for each cluster according to
the model’s result. In each cluster, the number of COVID-19 cases has a negative
impact on sales. The least affected product group is “Daily Needs,” which also has
an insignificant p value as well. Other clusters show that there is a significant nega-
tive impact of COVID case numbers on sales.

Table 7  The impact of the number of COVID-19 cases on each cluster in the physical market
Variable Coefficient T values P values

Daily needs LnCaseNum − 0.01 − 1.44 0.15

Protein-based products LnCaseNum − 0.03 − 2.28 0.02
Basic consumption goods LnCaseNum − 0.03 − 2.97 0.00
Cold-chain products LnCaseNum − 0.03 − 2.33 0.02
SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82 Page 19 of 24 82

Table 8  The impact of the number of COVID-19 cases on each cluster in the online market
Variable Coefficient t values p values

Daily needs LnCaseNum 0.07 4.71 0.00

Protein-based products LnCaseNum 0.05 3.18 0.00
Basic consumption goods LnCaseNum 0.03 1.99 0.04
Cold-chain products LnCaseNum 0.06 3.72 0.00

The impact of the number of COVID‑19 cases on each cluster in the online market

The number of COVID-19 cases in each cluster positively affects the online mar-
ket; as the number of infected cases increases, sales levels also increase. The least
affected product group is Basic Consumption Goods, as shown by its p value and t
value.
As can be seen from Tables 7 and 8, the physical market is negatively affected by
the number of infected cases, whereas online market sales are positively impacted
by it. In the physical market, the least affected cluster is Daily Needs, while Basic
Consumptions goods are the least affected in the online market. The decrease in
sales levels in the physical market caused an increase in those of the online market
for Daily Needs.
Case numbers for the Daily Needs category are only statistically significant, with
a 0.85 confidence level for the physical market’s regression model. On the contrary,
the regression model in the online market is significant at the 0.995 level. These
results suggest that there is a non-dramatic decrease in the sales for the physical
market and a considerable increase in demand for the online market. This circum-
stance suggests that the increase in online channels results in not only a decrease in
sales for the physical channel but also the existence of extra demand for the online
channel.

Conclusion and further suggestions

Unlike natural disasters, such as earthquakes, tsunamis, and tornadoes, pandemics

spread worldwide, and their effect is not limited to a specific region. The most strik-
ing difference between pandemics and other disasters is that the economic impact is
not caused by the pandemic but by how the public responds. During the COVID-19
crisis, consumers’ spending priorities quickly shifted as it fanned out and authorities
took action.
As revealed by this research findings, consumers have turned to online retailers
for essentials and discretionary items alike during the crisis. Therefore, the accel-
eration of e-commerce adoption translates into greater business-to-consumer (B2C)
package volumes, and more pressure is placed on last-mile delivery performance. To
thrive after the pandemic, retailers must understand and adapt to these changes. To
provide customers with what they want, retailers must carry various items. Many of
82 Page 20 of 24 SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82

these changes in spending patterns are likely to be temporary, reflecting caution in

times of great uncertainty; as conditions improve and consumer confidence returns,
discretionary spending in some categories rebounds. However, some shifts may
prove to be more permanent. Before COVID-19, retailers mainly focused on their
supply chains’ efficiency, speed, and reliability. The pandemic showed how quickly
global supply chains could be disrupted, slowed, and even stopped. Therefore, retail-
ers should prioritize resiliency rather than efficiency by incorporating integrated and
agile approaches.
Immediately after the first official COVID-19 case that was announced in the
early hours of the 13th of March 2020, Turkey took several precautions to limit
the spread of the virus. The first impact of the pandemic on food and fast-moving
consumer goods (FMCG) retail sub-sectors triggered an acceleration in consump-
tion just 1–2 days after the Minister of Health’s announcement. However, the rapid
increase in the number of new cases from 3 on the 15th of March to 670 on the
20th of the same month forced the government to enact nationwide restrictions that
would affect the retail sector, such as curfews for the elderly and the temporary clo-
sure of service businesses, such as barbershops, restaurants, dining places, and patis-
series (other than delivery or takeaway). The first restrictions for grocery shopping
came into effect by April 2020. In addition to weekend curfews and limitations on
the maximum number of customers allowed in supermarkets, the opening hours of
stores were also shortened.
In the first month of the pandemic, YoY growth in retail sales with constant
prices contracted to 0.7% from 11% of the previous month. Hence, the situation’s
urgency was not acknowledged until the last week of March; retail indicators for
the third month of the year failed to reflect the real impact of the COVID-19 pan-
demic on retail economics in Turkey. However, in April and May 2020, retail sales
recorded a yearly 20% and 17.4% YoY decline, respectively. On the one hand, the
textile and apparel sub-group of the retail sector suffered the worst decline in sales
with 41% YoY terms due to public health restrictions, while the grocery sub-sec-
tor remained robust, with a 12% yearly increase in April 2020. Finally, the online
retail sector continued its expansion during the pandemic, and the average yearly
increase in online monthly sales stood at 95% for the second half of 2020. However,
soon after restrictions were eased in June 2020, the annual trends in the retail sector
returned to their normal levels.
This research aimed to investigate whether the COVID-19 pandemic changed
consumer shopping behavior in supermarkets. The most affected product groups
were also revealed by comparing the changes in shopping habits in physical versus
online markets. One of the largest retailers in Turkey was selected for the case study,
and their data from 2019 to 2020 were used to address the question mentioned ear-
lier. After cleaning the data, a hierarchical clustering technique was used to identify
the product groups that showed similarities in shopping behaviors for both physi-
cal and online markets. The sales levels of each product group were then estimated
using three different regression models—Stepwise, Lasso, and Best-fit—separately
for each market. The best model for each cluster per market was selected, and the
changes in shopping behavior for each cluster group in both physical and online
markets were highlighted.
SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82 Page 21 of 24 82

The cluster analysis showed that all six product groups saw a significant change
in sales levels compared to 2019, the pre-COVID period. The most in-demand prod-
uct group in both physical and online markets is Basic Consumption Goods (i.e.,
grains, pasta, and sides; cleaning and paper products). In online markets, sales for
all product groups increased compared to 2019. Even after curfews, physical market
sales for all product groups were still significantly higher.
All of the clusters in both physical and online markets saw a sudden increase in
sales at the beginning of the COVID-19 period, suggesting stockpiling and panic-
buying behavior in both shopping channels. At the end of 2020, behaviors turned
into normal purchases since sales numbers began to decrease after several months.
Online markets still had a significantly higher sales ratio, signaling that people
started to get used to online shopping because various products were made acces-
sible to the consumer. Based on the physical market’s regression model, the number
of cases parameter for the Daily Needs category is only significant with a 0.85 con-
fidence level, which translates to a non-dramatic decrease in sales for this category.
On the other hand, the parameter indicating the infected daily cases in the online
market’s regression model is significant at 0.995 level and indicates a substantial
increase in demand. This phenomenon reveals that the increase in the case of the
Daily Needs cluster in online channel sales not only stemmed from demand reverted
from the physical channel but also the extra demand attracted for the online channel.
As can be seen from the regression analysis conducted, the number of COVID-19
cases affected shopping habits. Curfews also had a significant effect on sales levels.
The included dummy variables that indicated the dates where a significant change
was observed afterward—the 25th of May, 1st of June, and 12th of December—
showed that the sales levels on these dates were the most affected. Limitations, cur-
fews, and the number of cases made people shift from physical shopping to shop-
ping through online markets.
In line with the results derived above, while the effects of the pandemic de-esca-
lated in the final quarter of 2021 thanks to the worldwide vaccination programs, the
retailer company investigated in this research announced that they would focus on
enhancing their online channel penetration in the future. According to the compa-
ny’s recent press releases, the increased sales from its online channel acceleration
continued through 2021. By the third quarter of 2021, the YoY change in online
sales reached 99% (CPI YoY 20%). Company officials also reported that the share of
online sales had reached 15% of sales, excluding alcoholic beverages and tobacco.
In addition, the company plans to establish a new online grocery section to support
its expanding online channel. This attempt is totally in parallel to the evolving digi-
tal age, which provides significant opportunities to retailers in the face of challenges
(Villanova et al. 2021).
Based on the methodology proposed in this research, changes in consumer pur-
chasing habits among retailers having similar product configurations in Turkey
can be evaluated in future research. This will allow more generalized results to be
obtained for Turkey’s retail sector. In addition, the proposed methodology can also
be utilized to investigate the changes in consumer shopping habits in retailers in
other countries. This can specify whether the changes in consumer shopping habits
of a country show any similarities or differences to other countries.
82 Page 22 of 24 SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82

Acknowledgements On behalf of all the authors, the corresponding author states that there is no conflict
of interest.

Author contributions ÖZ: provided the dataset, FÜ and BÜ: designed the model and computational
framework, EHG: analyzed the dataset, carried out the implementation and performed the calculations.
The study was supervised by FÜ as Thesis Advisor. The first draft of the manuscript was written by EHG
and all the authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All the authors read and approved
the final manuscript.

Funding No funding was received for conducting this study.

Data availability The data that support the findings of this study are available from Migros but restric-
tions apply to the availability of these data, which were used under license for the current study, and so
are not publicly available. Data are, however, available from the authors upon reasonable request and with
permission of Migros.

Declarations
Conflict of interest All the authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

Ethical approval This article does not contain any studies with human participants or animals performed
by any of the authors.

Consent for permission No permission required. All figures, diagrams, schemes, tables, and text in this
manuscript are original, unpublished work.

References
Boyle P, Bond R, Carracedo JM, Simmons G, Mulvenna M, Hollywood L (2022) The impact of the
COVID-19 pandemic on grocery shopper behaviour: analysis of shopper behaviour change using
store transaction data. J of Consumer Behav 21(2):259–271
Brock TC (1968) Implications of commodity theory for value change. Psychological foundations of atti-
tudes. Academic Press, New York, pp 243–275
Buetre B, Kim Y, Tran QT, Gunasekera D (2006) Avian influenza: potential economic impact of a pan-
demic on Australia. Aust. Commod Forecast Issues. 13(2):351–359
Chen Y, Rajabifard A, Sabri S, Potts KE, Laylavi F, Xie Y, Zhang Y (2020) A discussion of irrational
stockpiling behaviour during crisis. J of Saf Sci and Resil 1(1):57–58
Chiu W, Oh GE, Cho H (2022) Impact of COVID-19 on consumers’ impulse buying behavior of fitness
products: a moderated mediation model. J of Consumer Behav 21(2):245–258
Eysenbach G (2006) Infodemiology: tracking flu-related searches on the web for syndromic surveillance.
In: AMIA Annu. Symp. Proc. American Medical Informatics Association. 2006: 244
Frank DA, Peschel AO (2020) Sweetening the deal: the ingredients that drive consumer adoption of
online grocery shopping. J of Food Prod Mark 26(8):535–544
Friedman J, Hastie T, Tibshirani R (2010) Regularization paths for generalized linear models via coordi-
nate descent. J of Stat Softw 33(1):1
Gareth J, Daniela W, Trevor H, Robert T (2013) An introduction to statistical learning: with applications
in R. Springer
Ginsberg J, Mohebbi MH, Patel RS, Brammer L, Smolinski MS, Brilliant L (2009) Detecting influenza
epidemics using search engine query data. Nat 457(7232):1012–1014
Hall MC, Prayag G, Fieger P, Dyason D (2020) Beyond panic buying: consumption displacement and
COVID-19. J. of Serv. Manag. 32(1):113–128
Hand C, Riley FDO, Harris P, Singh J, Rettie R (2009) Online grocery shopping: the influence of situ-
ational factors. Eur. J. of Mark. 43(9/10):1205–1219
Hebbali A (2020) olsrr: tools for building ols regression models. R package version 0.5.3. Available via
https://​CRAN.R-​proje​ct.​org/​packa​ge=​olsrr
SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82 Page 23 of 24 82

Islam T, Pitafi AH, Arya V, Wang Y, Akhtar N, Mubarik S, Xiaobei L (2021) Panic buying in the
COVID-19 pandemic: a multi-country examination. J of Retail and Consumer Serv 59:102357
Ivanov D (2020) Viable supply chain model: integrating agility, resilience and sustainability perspec-
tives-lessons from and thinking beyond the COVID-19 pandemic. Ann. of Operations Res.
319(1):1411–1431
Jonung L, Roeger W (2006) The macroeconomic effects of a pandemic in Europe-A model-based assess-
ment. Available via SSRN 920851.
Keogh-Brown MR, Wren-Lewis S, Edmunds WJ, Beutels P, Smith RD (2010) The possible macroeco-
nomic impact on the UK of an influenza pandemic. Health Econ 19(11):1345–1360
Thomas Lumley based on Fortran code by Alan Miller (2020) leaps: Regression Subset Selection. R
package version 3.1. Available via https://​CRAN.R-​proje​ct.​org/​packa​ge=​leaps, Accessed 23 May
2021
Micalizzi L, Zambrotta NS, Bernstein MH (2021) Stockpiling in the time of COVID-19. Br J of Health
Psychology 26(2):535–543
Ministry of Health (2021) Covid-19 Rehberi. Available via https://​covid​19.​saglik.​gov.​tr/​TR-​66301/​covid-​
19-​rehbe​ri.​html. Accessed 7 Jan 2023
Muhammad NS, Sujak H, Abd Rahman S (2016) Buying groceries online: the influences of electronic
service quality (eServQual) and situational factors. Procedia Econ and Finance 37:379–385
Park K, Brumberg A, Yonezawa K (2020) The covid-19 shopper: Shopping habits during covid-19. Dep.
of Appl. Econ. and Manag. Cornell University Ext. Bulletin.
Pauzi SFF, Thoo AC, Tan LC, Muharam FM, Talib NA (2017) Factors influencing consumers intention
for online grocery shopping–a proposed framework. IOP Conf. Ser. Mater. Sci. Eng. 215(1):012013
Petrescu M, Krishen AS (2020) The importance of high-quality data and analytics during the pandemic. J
of Mark Anal 8(2):43–44
Provost F, Fawcett T (2013) Data Science for Business: What you need to know about data mining and
data-analytic thinking. O’Reilly Media Inc, Sebastopol
Rahnamaee A, Berger PD (2013) Investigating consumers’ online purchasing behavior: single-brand
e-retailers versus multi-brand e-retailers. J of Mark Anal 1(3):138–148
Saenz H, Stephan J, Terino J, Bysong T, Gnamm J (2020) How to trace a path to resilient, sustain sup-
ply chains. Available via BAIN. https://​www.​bain.​com/​insig​hts/​resil​ient-​susta​inable-​supply-​chains/
Accessed 8 Jan 2021
Sarkis J (2020) Supply chain sustainability: learning from the COVID-19 pandemic. Int J Oper Prod
Manag 41(1):63–73
Sarkis J, Cohen MJ, Dewick P, Schröder P (2020) A brave new world: Lessons from the COVID-19 pan-
demic for transitioning to sustainable supply and production. Resour Conserv Recycl 159:104894
Shearer C (2000) The CRISP-DM Model: the new blueprint for data mining. J. of Data Warehous.
5(4):13–22
Simchi-Levi D, Simchi-Levi E (2020) Build. Resilient Supply Chains won’t be easy. Harvard Busi-
ness Review. Available via https://​hbr.​org/​2020/​06/​build​ing-​resil​ient-​supply-​chains-​wont-​be-​easy.
Accessed 20 Jan 2021
Soares JC, Limongi R, De Sousa Júnior JH, Santos WS, Raasch M, Hoeckesfeld L (2022) Assessing the
effects of COVID-19-related risk on online shopping behavior. J of Mark Anal. https://​doi.​org/​10.​
1057/​s41270-​022-​00156-9
Sohn S, Seegebarth B, Woisetschläger DM (2022) The same only different? How a pandemic shapes con-
sumer organic food purchasing. J. of Consumer Behav. 21(5):1121–1134
Szymkowiak A, Gaczek P, Jeganathan K, Kulawik P (2021) The impact of emotions on shopping behav-
ior during epidemic: what a business can do to protect customers. J of Consumer Behav 20(1):48–60
Truong D, Truong MD (2022) How do customers change their purchasing behaviors during the COVID-
19 pandemic? J of Retail and Consumer Serv 67:102963
Türkiye İstatistik Kurumu (TÜİK). TÜİK. (n.d.). Available via https://​www.​tuik.​gov.​tr/ Accessed 7 Jan
2023
Turan AH (2012) Internet shopping behavior of Turkish customers: comparison of two competing mod-
els. J Theor Appl Electron Commer Res 7(1):77–93
Turkish Statistical Institute (2021) Hanehalkı Bilişim Teknolojileri Kullanım Araştırması [Information
and Communication Technology Usage Survey on Households]. Available via http://​www.​tuik.​gov.​
tr/​PreHa​berBu​ltenl​eri.​do?​id=​18660. Accessed 23 May 21
Tversky A, Kahneman D (1992) Advances in prospect theory: cumulative representation of uncertainty. J
of Risk and Uncertain 5(4):297–323
82 Page 24 of 24 SN Bus Econ (2023) 3:82

Villanova D, Bodapati AV, Puccinelli NM, Tsiros M, Goodstein RC, Kushwaha T, Hatfield C (2021)
Retailer marketing communications in the digital age: getting the right message to the right shopper
at the right time. J of Retail 97(1):116–132
Wikimedia Foundation (2022) Covid-19 pandemic in Turkey. Wikipedia. Available via https://​en.​wikip​
edia.​org/​wiki/​COVID-​19_​pande​mic_​in_​Turkey Accessed 8 Jan 2023

Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under
a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted
manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and
applicable law.