TikTok Turns the Grocery Store Into a Vacation Destination
September 11, 2024 | 2 min to read
As consumers increasingly turn to TikTok for travel inspiration, a viral trend known as grocery store tourism is emerging, elevating supermarkets to cultural destinations. Sparked by user @marissainchina in a video suggesting grocery shopping can be a form of sightseeing, the trend has gained traction with videos amassing millions of views, highlighting how travelers value the cultural experience of visiting grocery stores abroad.
As consumers increasingly turn to TikTok for travel inspiration, a viral trend, grocery store tourism, has many seeing the supermarket as a cultural destination.
Many social media users attribute the start of the trend to TikTok user @marissainchina, who posted a video in late spring asserting, “This may be controversial, but I think the best thing to do while traveling is go to the grocery store. … Going to a grocery store could technically be counted as sightseeing, right? Because not only is it a cultural experience, but you can also find lots of stuff to bring back as souvenirs.”
The video has over 422,000 views, and the trend has taken off. A TikTok posted in June from user @caroluzitus celebrating “traveling with people who view grocery stores abroad as a cultural experience” has surpassed 3 million views. Similarly, a video from around the same time captioned “POV: You travel with someone whose international trip is not complete without the cultural experience of going to a grocery store” has garnered nearly 2 million.
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