A cut is a search. Somebody looking for a particular joint has planned the meal already and is simply finding a counter that carries it — the least contested traffic in food retail.
Christmas is the search event of the year and it starts in October. Turkeys, three-bird roasts and rib joints are looked for weeks ahead, and the shops that appear then take orders that are effectively prepaid.
Barbecue demand follows the weather rather than the calendar. A run of warm days sends people looking for something to cook outside, and a shop that has published what is ready captures it that afternoon.
Old-fashioned and hard-to-find items travel. Dripping, suet, bones for stock, offal: small searches with almost no competition, and the people making them will drive past three supermarkets.