Denna studie undersöker hur olika beröringspunkter påverkar kundengagemanget inom dagligvaruhandeln. Då trenden går mot att se till kundens helhetsupplevelse inom ett företags ekosystem snarare än det enskilda köpet blir kundengagemang och omnikanal två begrepp som kan ses som högst aktuella att studera när företag idag ska utforma sin beröringspunktarkitektur. Beröringspunkter är alla de kontaktpunkter, såväl fysiska som digitala, mellan ett varumärke och en kund. Dessa beröringspunkter verkar tillsammans och bidrar alla genom omnikanalsperspektivet till en sammansatt kundupplevelse. Skapandet av denna upplevelse kallas tjänstedesign och inbegriper att noggrannt orkestrera den beröringspunktsarkitektur i vilket kunden befinner sig under sin kundresa. Vidare undersöker denna studie ovannämnda process i ljuset av Process Virtualization Theory (PVT) vilken verkar som ett verktyg för att förstå i vilken utsträckning en beröringspunkt lämpar sig för digitalisering. Därtill appliceras Uses and Gratification Theory (UGT) för att förstå de bakomliggande faktorer som påverkar kundengagemang. Mot bakgrund av detta teoretiska ramverk utförs tretton stycken semistrukturerade intervjuer med card sorting för att undersöka vilka attityder och beteende som finns relaterade till de olika beröringspunkterna för ett specifikt företag inom den svenska dagligvaruhandeln. Resultatet visar att de viktigaste beröringspunkterna för kundengagemang är erbjudanden, rabatter och medlemskap samt den fysiska butiken. Den sistnämnda inbegriper butikens atmosfär, utbud och geografiska läge. Dessa beröringspunkter är den huvudsakliga anledningen till att en kund väljer att handla hos en viss butik. Det finns även andra faktorer som påverkar valet och olika faktorer spelar olika stor roll beroende på situation, dock antyder resultaten att de andra faktorerna oftast endast spelar en sekundär roll. Resultaten kan även till stor del förklaras av de två ovannämnda modellerna. För att öka sitt kundengagemang som företag inom dagligvaruhandeln förslås slutligen att det bör investeras i digitala lösningar som förstärker upplevelsen kring beröringspunkter i omnikanaler, i den usträckning PVT-modeller antyder att det skulle vara lämpligt. Dessa lösningar bör även inkorporera de motivationsfaktorer som UGT-modellen föreslår i de viktigaste beröringspunkterna. Ett användande av dessa lösningar som digitala verktyg skulle möjligtvis kunna leda till att den fysiska och digitala världen bättre kan mötas genom en omnikanal vilket slutligen bidrar till en mer sammansatt och positiv kundupplevelse genom hela kundresan. / This paper examines the importance of different touchpoints within a customer journey for increased customer engagement, focusing specifically on the grocery market. Because of the trend within the commerce industry to consider at customer’s overall experience as oppose to the individual purchase, customer engagement and omnichannel are therefore highly relevant approaches for a company to consider when forming their touchpoint architecture.  Touchpoints can be physical as well as digital points of contact between a brand and a customer. These touchpoints normally work in joint co-operation with each other, through omnichannels, for a complete customer experience. This complete experience is formed through the process of service design which includes a thoroughly designed touchpoint architecture in which the customer travels as part of her customer journey. Furthermore, this paper examines to which extent a process can be digitalised through applying the Process Virtualization Theory (PVT) model. In order to understand the customer engagement process and the reasons behind customer engagement the Uses and Gratification Theory (UGT) model is also applied. With this theoretic background in place thirteen semi-structured interviews with a card sorting exercise was conducted to examine the attitudes and behaviours related to, and associated with, a company’s touchpoints within the Swedish grocery market industry. The customer research presented in this paper shows that the most important touchpoints for customer engagement are store offers and discounts, a grocery store’s atmosphere and supply and finally store location. These touchpoints are the main reasons to why customers choose to engage with a grocery store brand as they are perceived as the most important reasons a specific brand is chosen. There are other reasons too, and often the choice of brand is also determined by convenience and time available. However, the study shows that these reasons are only secondary to the former reasons. These results are supported by the two models mentioned above. In order to increase customer engagement a brand should therefore put resources into digital solutions, to the extent possible according to the PVT model, to reinforce the motivational factors from the UGT-model in these touchpoints. This way the physical and digital world would meet through omnichannel as the solutions would assist customers in their customer journey to make their overall experience better.

Background: E-commerce for groceries is growing and growing in Sweden and pure ecommerce companies are constantly entering the market. This study is based on Ica, which for a long time has been successful in the physical market through decentralization and the Ica-idea with individual retailers incollaboration and physical stores. To meet the new type of consumer behavior and competition Ica has developed a number of e-commerce solutions. Including the phenomenon of dark stores that indicates a new type of centralization within the group. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to analyze the experienced opportunities and limitations of a retailer-owned franchise organization in the Swedish grocery trade in its development work of e-commerce. A further purpose is to shed light on the interviewees reasoning about whether dark stores are a sustainable solution from a competitive and relational perspective. Method: In this study, a qualitative research strategy is applied in a case study design. The empirical data is generated through semi-structured interviews with managers and retailers from Ica stores in the Stockholm region and the ecommerce manager for Ica Sweden. The empirical data has then been codedand divided into four themes with associated subcategories. Literaturestudy: For the essay a literature study presenting theories and previous research on centralization and decentralization, vertical and horizontal integration, click-and-mortar, omni channels and competition was made. Afterwards it´s used as a basis for the theoretical comparison in the analysis part. Conclusion: Due to the ownership structure, the case organization is facing some unique conditions. Example, the decentralized power promotes quickness and opportunities for local adaptations, but also that a pure e-commerce modelwould be problematic. One solution the head office has developed is a dark stores service that the stores can use, which gives them access to a larger geographic market and leads to higher internal competition between thestores.