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If pushing a cart up and down the lengthy aisles of your neighborhood supermarket — past dozens of brands of packaged cereal and crackers lit by fluorescent lights — feels overwhelming and soul-sucking, you're not alone.

But there's some good news: The days of shopping this way may be numbered.

Here's why: Traditional grocers are increasingly losing market share — some 15 percent in the last 10 years — to more nimble competitors like smaller markets, convenience stores, farmers markets and even dollar stores. That, along with the rise of online food shopping, is forcing the old-school grocers to innovate in ways that should yield a better overall experience for consumers down the road.

"The bottom line is that for the supermarket to survive and prosper and grow, it's going to have to offer more services," says Phil Lempert, a consumer behavior analyst who tracks these trends on his site SupermarketGuru.

He spoke about the "grocery wars" and where the sector is headed in the next 10 years earlier this month at SXSW. (We couldn't make it to his panel, so we got him to bend our ear afterward.)

The Salt

'Old-School' Food Shopping Feels New As U.S. Cities Revive Public Markets

Lempert illuminated for us five ways in which grocery chains are evolving (that don't involve fluorescent lights).

Some companies are adapting faster than others. But Lempert says most big grocery chains have realized that if they're going to win back some of the shoppers who've drifted away, they're going to have to get a lot more creative and flexible.

1. The "groceraunt:" Maybe you've seen delis and cafes flanked by seating areas pop up in national chains like Safeway and Whole Foods. But what about a full-service restaurant?

Meet the "groceraunt," where the food is supposed to be tempting enough to get you to sit down to a meal before or after you pick up the milk and eggs. At Market Grille, the restaurant inside several locations of the Hy-Vee chain in the Midwest and Great Plains, you can order sushi, steak, brunch and maybe even on-tap apple cider.

In Illinois, the Mariano's grocery chain now features an oyster bar and a barbecue stall, which the Chicago Reader described as "supermarket barbecue that's better than it should be."

And in the Twin Cities, the Lunds and Byerlys chain has its Minnesota Grille, along with a Lunds & Byerlys Kitchen with "prepared food offerings, a wine and beer bar, a tailored selection of groceries and more all in one space."

2. Smaller stores: The average grocery store size started shrinking from about 45,000 square feet three years ago, after decades of increasing year after year.

As we've reported, part of that trend is about the return of green grocers to cities: new versions of the neighborhood market or bodega that stock mostly high-end and local foods in spaces smaller than the produce section of the supermarket.

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Each Peach Market in Washington, D.C., is one of a growing breed of small, urban greengrocers. Maanvi Singh/NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Maanvi Singh/NPR

Each Peach Market in Washington, D.C., is one of a growing breed of small, urban greengrocers.

Maanvi Singh/NPR

Why is this format taking off? Turns out, consumers may not actually want to have to choose between 10 brands of olive oil that are all pretty much the same (and unlikely to make us happier, a la The Paradox of Choice). Rather, it may be more pleasing to choose between two bottles that are distinct in quality, flavor or price.

The big retailers have noticed these small markets encroaching on their turf, and are making moves to get smaller, too. According to Lempert, Wal-Mart, Lunds and others are prototyping smaller stores. And Cincinnati grocery-store chain Kroger has been experimenting with a 7,500-square-foot format in Columbus, Ohio, that's a sort of hybrid between a supermarket and a convenience store.

3. More services: Lempert notes that many consumers don't need or want all their food under one roof anymore — they're willing to go from the farmers market to the wine shop to the butcher.

How can grocery stores stay relevant then? Maybe by hiring a really good fishmonger.

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Big grocery chains like Kroger are beginning to experiment with smaller format stores, says Lempert. Nicholas Eckhart/Flickr hide caption

itoggle caption Nicholas Eckhart/Flickr

Big grocery chains like Kroger are beginning to experiment with smaller format stores, says Lempert.

Nicholas Eckhart/Flickr

Most chains sell meat and fish that's been filleted and sliced and wrapped up off-site. But more are starting to install skilled butchers and fishmongers to cut meat right there in the store. They're also hiring trained chefs, sommeliers and registered dieticians to guide shoppers to healthier choices. Lempert points to Hy-Vee Market, which has hired several chefs trained at the Culinary Institute of America to cook its prepared food, and two dieticians that lead weight management programs.

4. Catering to millennials: Corporate America is smitten with millennials, who seem to be leading food trends. And grocery chains are no different.

According to Lempert, the big chains are trying entice millennials with the foods they want — local, craft and fermented foods, and big international flavors (i.e. kimchi) — when they want them. Millennials also want "connection and community," which stores can foster with seasonal events, tastings and cooking demos, Lempert says.

The Salt

Ordering Food Online? That'll Be More Calories, Cost And Complexity

5. More ways to get your groceries delivered: Another thing about millennials: They may want to avoid the store entirely and have their groceries dropped off.

To keep them and other online shopping enthusiasts as customers, grocery chains are partnering with tech companies like Instacart, Google Express, Amazon and Uber, which send couriers to stores to pick up groceries and then deliver them within an hour.

And while most consumers will continue to go to the store to select their tomatoes and bread themselves, Rosenheim Advisors reported in December 2014 that the food tech sector is booming. "More than $1.6 billion was invested [in 2013] into food-related tech companies, up 33 percent from $1.2 billion in 2012," it noted.

Will all these efforts win customers back? That's unclear, says Lempert. "To be successful, a retailer has to know its consumer. And these days, every neighborhood is different. The days of every store having an identical assortment of food are over."

grocery delivery

grocery stores

We learned Monday morning what will become of The Daily Show on Comedy Central after Jon Stewart departs: it will be hosted by Trevor Noah, a 31-year-old South African comedian who joined the show as a contributor in December of last year, where he opened with a joke about fearing the police in the United States more than the police in South Africa. We won't know much about the shape of the new (or at least different) show for a while, but there are a few things to chew over in the wake of this news.

1. Noah has a couple of demographic characteristics not in common with Stewart or with much (but not all) of the rest of late-night comedy: he's young (only 31), he's biracial, and he's not American. He's also a guy who does a lot of comedy about race in his own standup, as in a set from London where he talks about how the marriage of his parents (as well as his birth) was actually illegal, and how his mother had to drop his hand and pretend not to be his mother in front of the police. ("I felt like a bag of weed.") It's not just the fact that Noah is biracial that makes him feel like a choice relevant to the moment; it's the fact that he's a performer who does a lot of very pointed material about race who's taking over the show at a time when Stewart, too, was spending a lot of time talking about it.

Picking Noah also means the show's coverage of the upcoming presidential election — historically some of its most-discussed work — will be headed up by someone who isn't an American. That would have seemed like more of a headline, perhaps, prior to the ascendancy of John Oliver, who not only was a star on The Daily Show, but has now established himself as a commentator on American politics over on his own show on HBO, Last Week Tonight.

2. It might seem surprising that they would have Noah take over after such a short time with the show, but they undoubtedly vetted him pretty thoroughly before they added him in the first place. In a lot of ways, it's probably smart to pick somebody who is of the show, but not too much of the show. Had they chosen one of the veteran correspondents who was so closely associated with Stewart's version of The Daily Show, the old host's absence might have felt more glaring. This pick provides some continuity but also a solid break between the old and the new, and perhaps some chance at making it his own.

3. Coverage of The Daily Show has historically treated it as a pure expression of Stewart's sensibility, despite the fact that he's supported by a staff of writers and producers. (Honestly, it's a common problem with visible hosts and their invisible collaborators.) With Noah being so much younger and newer to the scene than Stewart has been for many, many years — and so much less familiar to much of the audience — we may see a shift toward the show being treated as less of a tour de force and more of a collaboration, which probably represents it more honestly, particularly while he's getting himself established.

4. Speaking of writers, it will be interesting to see whether the existing writing staff sticks around without Stewart. Having to populate that writers' room with new people would represent both a huge challenge and a huge opportunity.

5. And finally, for perspective's sake, it's important to remember that Jon Stewart today is an institution, but Jon Stewart when he took the show over from Craig Kilborn in early 1999 was not. David Letterman was coming off a canceled daytime show when he got into late night, and Conan O'Brien was a little-known camera presence when he got Letterman's old job. The goofy idea of clear trajectories — that informed, crowdsourced, listicled speculation ought to be able to produce the most logical person to occupy every job based on publicly available lists of accomplishments and pro/con rundowns — is one that we're probably lucky people don't actually pay attention to.

A Bangladeshi blogger has been hacked to death in the country's capital, Dhaka, and police have arrested two students at an Islamic seminary in connection with the slaying. Washiqur Rahman's killing comes a month after a deadly attack on another blogger in the capital by Islamists.

Rahman, 26, was attacked at 9 a.m. (local time) by three men who used meat cleavers, a local police official told the Dhaka Tribune. He was taken to Dhaka Medical College Hospital where he was declared dead on arrival, the newspaper reported.

The newspaper said Rahman was apparently targeted for his writings about Islam. Two of his alleged attackers were arrested, and a third suspect fled.

The Tribune reported that Rahman's Facebook page contained posts that opposed what he called irrational religious belief. It said one of the Facebook groups he belonged to was called Atheist Bangladesh.

Rahman had apparently expressed solidarity on Facebook with Avijit Roy, the Bangladeshi-American blogger who was hacked to death Feb. 27 in Dhaka for "crime[s] against Islam." On Facebook, Rahman had posted #iamavijit after Roy's killing.

Blogger Rajeeb Haider was hacked to death on Feb. 15, 2013, for apparently the same reason.

Muslims make up about 90 percent of the country's 166 million people.

Bangladesh

South Carolina Congressman Trey Gowdy's Benghazi Select Committee announced Friday in a statement that Hillary Clinton had wiped her private email server clean; the committee is getting no additional emails from her; it's leaving open the possibility of a third-party investigation; and Republicans are promising to bring Clinton in for more questioning.

Much of what the committee reported was already known. But the drama is likely to continue to play out — with questions of what she knew and when she knew it — over the next year right smack in the middle of a presidential campaign.

To be sure, the email controversy has not been good for Clinton. Instead of sitting back, watching Republicans duke it out, working on her presidential launch and trying to tailor her message, she has had to defend her exclusive use private email to conduct business as secretary of state.

But for all the attention it's gotten, not much has changed in the polls — so far.

In the nearly three weeks since Clinton's hotly watched press conference at the United Nations, there have been three major polls conducted dealing with Clinton and the emails specifically — CNN/ORC, CBS, and Reuters/Ipsos.

CNN's, conducted March 13-15 — less than a week after Clinton's news conference – showed Clinton continued to lead Republican contenders in similar numbers to before the news broke, and she saw just a slight decline in her favorability ratings from the prior poll.

She beats former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie 55-40 percent in hypothetical head-to-head matchups. She beats former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, 55-41 percent; Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, 55-42 percent; Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, 54-43 percent; and neurosurgeon Ben Carson, 56-40 percent.

Her favorability stood at 53 percent positive, 44 percent negative, down from 59-38 percent in November. But that plus-9 rating was better than the entire Republican field. Jeb Bush, for example, was minus-16 (31/47 percent), Walker was even (21/21), and Christie was minus-19 (25/44).

Some of the tightening happening with Clinton's ratings is to be expected as the campaign gears up. When she ran for president in 2007-2008, her positive-to-negative numbers were about even. When she was seen as non-political, as secretary of state, her ratings ballooned. And now, as she is about to likely embark on another presidential bid — as the far-and-away front runner for the Democratic nomination — she is being viewed more politically, and her numbers are returning to somewhere close to split.

In the CBS poll, conducted a little more than a week after the CNN one — from March 21 to 24 — about two-thirds said the email scandal did not change their opinion of Clinton. For fewer than 3-in-10, their opinion of her worsened. About the same percentage of independents also said so.

The poll also found Clinton would not be hurt at all in a primary. (There were no general election head-to-heads either asked or revealed.) In February, 81 percent of Democrats said they would consider voting for her. A month later — and after the news of the emails — it's exactly the same. Two-thirds of Democrats, though, do say they would prefer she have a strong primary.

Clinton's favorability ratings, though, were not strong in the CBS poll. Just 26 percent had a positive view of her, while 37 percent had a negative one. That is a 12-point drop since the fall of 2013 and an even steeper 31-point decline since her high of 57 percent favorable rating as secretary of state. Clinton's ratings, though, have taken a harder hit the CBS poll than in most other polls with a higher percentage of people saying they are undecided about Clinton, someone who has been in the public eye for more than two decades.

Reuters/Ispsos' tracking poll was conducted online — and therefore, is considered by the statistical community to be less reliable than live-caller polls — but a majority said the email story has had no impact on whether they will vote for her in a general election. Similar to CBS, just less than one-in-three said the emails story makes them less likely to vote for her. The poll did, however, find some softening of support among Democrats and support for a third-party investigation.

All of this is to say that this far out from an election, it's important to take a step back and take in all the data. Unquestionably, this email story is far from finished, but, at this point, it doesn't look like it's had a major impact on Clinton's standing.

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