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PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to provide an alternative framework that will assist in understanding the adoption of digital food shopping. The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has exacerbated the demand for digital shopping, but the adoption of digital shopping for food has not accelerated as fast as in other product categories. This study considered the role of socio-cultural factors to understand the reason for slow adoption of digital technology to access food. A cultural framework that can be used to investigate socio-cultural factors in this context was lacking, however, this paper provides a discussion of social and cultural factors and developed measurement scales to assist in understanding cultural change acceptance in consumers' adoption of digital technology to purchase food.Design/methodology/approachUsing Hayes' process analysis, this paper investigated how cultural acceptance – mediated by consumer affection and appeal and measuring the moderated effects of digital trust (DT) – determined the eventual impact on consumer intention to adopt digital food retailing. This paper also considered moderated mediation with parallel mediations (consumer affection and appeal, digital convenience (DC) and consumer digital readiness) interacting with DT and consumer learning.FindingsThe authors found that cultural acceptance of digital technology (CADT) is an antecedent to the adoption of digital shopping for food, but this is also mediated by consumers' appeal and affection for digital technology and consumers' digital readiness.Practical implicationsThis study also indicates that DT influences consumer appeal and affection (CAA), especially amongst female consumers.Originality/valueThe paper represents an empirical investigation of a new conceptual framework that considers socio-cultural factors to understand consumers' use of digital technology in food shopping which has been an existing knowledge gap in current literature.

PurposeSmart retail technology adoption models are largely focused on consumer perceptions of the technology and the characteristics of digital technologies. However, the impact of the prior-to-use knowledge of consumers on the adoption of the technologies has been understudied. This research examined to what extent social acceptance and consumer learning can facilitate consumer adoption of digital grocery shopping (DGS).Design/methodology/approachThis paper builds on the innovation–decision model to develop a framework to examine the impact of social acceptance and consumer learning on DGS. The research tested a structural model based on data collected from 611 North American participants.FindingsThis study found that the social acceptance of DGS directly and consumer learning indirectly affects the appeal of grocery shopping to consumers and consequently increases their intention to adopt this new shopping method. Furthermore, the results indicated that both hypothesised directions are parallelly mediated by digital convenience, the consumer’s digital readiness and digital trust.Originality/valueThis study extends the understanding of consumer adoption of DGS by highlighting the influence of consumer knowledge about DGS on their behavioural intention. Several important theoretical and practical implications are provided to help retail managers to develop service strategies.