New data from meal-planning and smart-shopping platform Appetise has suggested that separating Foodstuffs' retail banners may not materially change where budget-conscious shoppers already believe they get the best value.
Among New Zealand Appetise users, 38 percent have PAK'nSAVE set as their default in-app shopping destination, compared with 16 percent for New World. Both banners currently sit within the wider Foodstuffs structure.
The figures land as politicians debate how to tackle grocery competition, with proposals ranging from structural reform to new regulation of supermarket pricing.
Appetise said its data pointed to a more immediate problem for households: grocery costs are biting now, and many shoppers are already making value decisions within the market as it exists today.
Toby Hilliam, CEO of Appetise, said the company’s view was that the biggest immediate opportunity for households was not tearing apart supermarket structures, but helping people shop more deliberately within the market that already exists.
"We do not think the answer is spending years trying to split up retailers while families are under pressure right now. The faster win is helping Kiwis see the specials that are already there and make better decisions with them. Appetise does that,” he said.
"Supermarkets do a good job in a tough market, and there are often real savings on offer if people can see them clearly and plan around them. The problem for a lot of households is that finding it across multiple stores every week takes time and effort most people do not have."
He said Appetise was designed to sit in that gap. Among New Zealand Appetise users, 38 percent selected saving money as their primary goal when setting up their profile, ahead of other motivations. That figure rises to 52 percent among users aged 18 to 24.
Appetise also found that 20.3 percent of recipe interactions among New Zealand users involved recipes tagged "Budget Friendly".
"Most brands are on special every second week. If consumers have simple visibility across stores, there are genuine opportunities to save money. That is where we think technology can help far sooner than a political debate about supermarket structures."
Hilliam said repeated efforts to engineer more competition had also shown how hard the market is to enter.
"New Zealand has already spent years talking about how to bring in more competition, and that has proved easier said than done. In the meantime, households still need practical tools that help them shop smarter now - planning meals around their budget, building smarter shopping lists, and comparing what different shops’ specials are, instead of waiting for industry change."
The figures are drawn from Appetise's aggregated, anonymised user base of more than 150,000 people across New Zealand and Australia as of September 2026. Percentages cited in this release are based on New Zealand users only. "Primary goal" refers to the single motivation each user selects when setting up their Appetise profile, and "linked supermarket" refers to the store each user has set as their default in-app shopping destination.
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