Reflections on the Supermarket Culture

The Safeway supermarket in Heidelberg, Melbourne, Australia.

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One balmy Friday evening, on the last night of winter, the automatic doors of the Heidelberg Safeway supermarket slid open with a well-oiled swish, welcoming me to the realms of consumer heaven.

Upon passing Safeway's threshold, I was flooded by a visual, physical and aural experience that to an unaccustomed individual may have proved astounding in its extravagance and proportion.

The Heidelberg Safeway supermarket is situated on the outskirts of the ‘Heidelberg Central’ shopping district, in the historically well-established, eastern metropolitan Melbourne suburb of Heidelberg. Surrounded by an extensive bitumen car park on two sides, and abutting a busy main road, a bottle shop, and a private secondary school, the large 24-hour supermarket commands a peripheral yet well-frequented position within the central business district of Heidelberg.

I have on countless occasions during my lifetime visited such supermarkets to engage in consumer activities. However, on this occasion it was not my intention to succumb to the rituals of consumerism, which normally characterise such visits. Such shopping centres do not normally pose as curiosities to me, because my cultural upbringing has taught me to accept them as a ‘way of life’. However, on this particular visit it was my intention to leave behind my learned ‘truths’ of society, and attempt to view the supermarket, and it’s associated activities and human interactions, through the eyes of an analytical observer.

Participant-observation research of this sort, as carried out by ethnographers, aims to critically analyse social relations and activities within a society. Such research requires the use of the ‘anthropological imagination’ for the development of a holistic, comparative and critical view of aspects of a culture or society. The first requirement of an anthropological imagination is the process of ‘decentring’, which involves losing one’s ethnocentrism (the act of judging unfamiliar cultures or situations from the vantage point of one’s own cultural understandings). This allows the anthropologist to view different cultures or societies from a cultural-relativist perspective – analysing them objectively without using the values of one culture to judge the worth of another. Decentring allows critical analysis of cultures or societies. Holistic, historical, comparative and reflexive perspectives are outcomes of such a critical analysis.

Through this study, I consider the roles that supermarkets play in the wider society, thus endeavouring to employ a holistic perspective. I also compare modern supermarkets to their historical equivalents, and describe gradual changes in the supermarket culture, in an attempt to convey a comparative and historical understanding of the supermarket culture.

However, when examining aspects of one’s own culture, such as the social relations within the framework of a supermarket, an anthropologist needs to assume the role of a cultural-relativist outsider, and perceive the supermarket untainted by cultural prejudices. So, by acknowledging my own preconceptions of this culture which I am familiar with, I attempt to be reflexive in my analysis. Thus, I return to my description of the Heidelberg Safeway supermarket.

Upon entering Safeway, I was greeted by the mellow sounds of a Dire Straits tune wafting above the aisles. A quiet buzz of activity surrounded me as I passed through another automatic gate, resisting the urge to collect a shopping trolley to wheel in front of me. Over 30 shoppers, aged predominantly between 20 and 40, were moving amongst the rows of aisles that fill the large warehouse-style premises. Stacked on the shelves were products categorised by aisle, divided into sections such as frozen foods, household goods, pet products, health foods, and so on. Store assistants were unpacking boxes of products and replenishing shelves with new items. Customers were lining up in queues, with bulging trolleys, waiting to have their selection of products processed by the checkout staff that attend the checkout counters which extend across the length of the store. Shoppers bustled past one another, avoiding eye contact or communication, as they manoeuvred their shopping trolleys through tight gaps in the crowded aisles, browsing the shelves for their desired choice of products.

The supermarket scene presents itself as a microcosm of the social organization of our capitalist consumer society. According to Robbins, the workings of capitalist society can be conceptualised as the conflicting relations between capitalists, labourers, and consumers (1999: 6). Within the supermarket culture, shoppers (‘customers’, in Safeway terminology) act as consumers of commodities. Many of these commodities are produced via a worldwide network of labourers, who each contribute to one aspect of the finished product. Robbins notes that an unprecedented level of ‘global integration’ has emerged recently as a central element of the ‘culture of capitalism’ (Robbins, 1999: 7). He observes that in the case of the American consumer, their clothes are predominantly ‘produced in whole or in part by people in Malaysia, Hong Kong, or El Salvador’ and that ‘the oranges [they] eat may have been grown in Spain, packed in cardboard boxes made of Canadian pulpwood, wrapped in plastic produced in New Jersey, and transported on trucks made in France with Italian, Japanese, and American parts (1999: 8).

Thus, the supermarket culture observable from within the supermarket itself, consists of consumers who buy things, and labourers who work for wages. But hidden behind the façade of the supermarket institution are capitalists, who own the supermarkets and the means of production; and labourers, who produce the commodities that are sold in the supermarkets around the world. In this way, supermarket culture exemplifies the social interactions existing within our global capitalist economy.

Sixty years ago, a typical grocer’s store would have involved markedly different social interactions than those in today’s supermarket (Seth & Randall, 1999: 1). Interaction between labourers, consumers and merchants in the 1940s was greatly personalised, compared with today’s practices (Seth & Randall, 1999: 1). Commodity production has become an increasingly alienating process since the advent of capitalism. Prior to the industrial revolution of the 1800s, European families and communities produced the majority of their own food and clothing needs. With industry development, came the alienation of labourers from their products, and the depersonalisation of consumer interactions.

As Gomes notes, commodities in the capitalist marketplace are completely alienable, and are exchanged through transactions predominantly between complete strangers (2001: lecture 6). Such impersonal buying and selling practices distance the labourers who produced the commodity, from the consumers who buy the product. This alienation is a significant aspect of capitalist society (Gomes, 2001: lecture 6).

This process of commodity exchange is accomplished via the common interface of money. All commodities have an intrinsic worth, which is assessable in terms of monetary value. Commodities are exchanged not for each other, but for their equal value in money.

Capitalist institutions are built on the principles of profit maximisation and perpetual growth (Robbins, 1999: 4). Capitalists strive to accumulate wealth, and this is largely achieved through exploitation of the labour force. Thus, many multinational corporations set up operations in countries that offer competitive tax breaks and who’s State casts a blind eye to worker rights. Supermarkets sell products that have originated from all over the world. At Heidelberg Safeway I noted that Johnson’s Kids ‘Strawberry Sensation’ shampoo is made in Malaysia; various cooking utensils are made in China; and assorted cotton socks are made in Indonesia.

Consumerism is heavily promoted by the capitalist institutions, as a fundamental aspect of ‘the way things are’. A vision of the world is constructed which helps maximise the production and consumption of goods (Robbins, 1999: 14). The prime elements of our culture are commodities, and it is our primary duty to consume them. The ‘shop till you drop’ ideology is promoted in many facets of our culture, not least through the supermarket. According to Robbins, our everyday activities such as work, leisure, and socialising, take place in the context of commodities. Shopping serves as a therapeutic activity in society, capable of solving our woes (1999: 14). Thus, the supermarket institution can be seen to espouse the consumer culture.

Robbins notes that advertising was a revolutionary development that influenced the creation of the consumer (1999: 15). Advertisements within Heidelberg Safeway are numerous, and act to instil such consumer ideologies. These advertisements play on personal insecurities, and create feelings of inadequacy in consumers, through suggestions that commodities can solve social problems. This is achieved through establishing false connections between commodities and realities. The ‘bakery’ signs in Safeway present an aura of health, wholesomeness and contentment, through their imagery of golden wheat fields and blue sky; a healthy young girl; and fresh golden bread. The depiction of hansom young men on L’Oreal hair dye packaging, suggests that you too could look like this, if only you bought this product.

Seemingly unnecessary commodities are given value by their perceived ability to change the consumer into a more desirable person (Robbins, 1999: 15). Safeway stocks six different brands of liquid soap – a commodity that could arguably be seen as unnecessary to the average household. One brand, Palmolive, supplies six different varieties of liquid soap. There is essentially no qualitative or quantitative difference between these different varieties except in their packaging, colouring, and odour. ‘Strawberry Sensation’ shampoo is one of five flavours in the Johnson’s Kids range. Such shampoos are qualitatively very similar to many other brands, differing merely in flavour and style of packaging. A two-metre wide toothbrush display illustrates that the apparent diversification of product range, gives consumers ‘choice’ and individuality, thus the appeal of commodities, to a wider range of consumers.

Heidelberg Safeway is built and operated, to effectively promote consumerism. A prime objective of supermarkets is to persuade shoppers to buy more products, more often. Certain aspects of the shopping-experience are seen to accomplish this objective. Relaxing, easy-listening music is played through the public-address system (interspersed with announcements and product advertisements), lulling shoppers into a sense of reassurance and security; contrasting and vibrantly coloured product displays are placed along aisles; clear, strong lighting creates a warm, bright ambience. The promise of ‘bargains’, ‘red spot specials’ and ‘discounts’ further promotes the consumer culture.

One interesting aspect of the history of supermarkets pertains to the supermarket shopping trolley. Since their introduction into the shopping experience, trolleys have experienced a marked increase in their size and volume. Trolleys were first introduced in the USA specifically to promote consumerism, through encouraging shoppers to accumulate more items than they could otherwise carry. Over the last fifteen years, I have observed a continued trend in trolley growth to the extent that aisle widths have been expanded accordingly, to allow the easy flow of supermarket-traffic.

All these aspects of the modern supermarket, and the Heidelberg Safeway specifically, indicate to us the role of the supermarket culture in the greater scheme of global capitalist consumer society. Ethnographic participant observation can be utilised to gain an understanding of such cultures, and the anthropological imagination is an invaluable tool for attempting to objectively describe and analyse such social and cultural phenomena.

Bibliography

• Gomes, A. 2001: ‘Lecture Notes’ week 6. La Trobe University

• Robbins, R. 1999. Global Problems and the Culture of Capitalism. USA: Allyn & Bacon

• Seth, A & Randall, G. 1999. The Grocers. London: Kogan Page Limited


This essay was first published by Virgil Cameron as an Anthropology Assignment, La Trobe University, 4 September 2001.