> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://docs.growthfactor.ai/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://docs.growthfactor.ai/data-and-analytics/trade-zones.md).

# Trade Zones

A trade zone is the area a location draws its customers from. It's the boundary every other measurement is taken inside, so the zone you choose determines which demographics, competitors, and market conditions count as relevant.

Three methods are available, each suited to a different question.

***

## Where Trade Zones Live

In a **study**, a trade zone is anchored to a pin or to one of your existing stores. Select the anchor, click **Draw trade zone**, and set the method. The form prefills from your workspace default, and falls back to a 1-mile ring if no default is saved. See [Shapes](/study/shapes.md) for drawing, linking, and combining them.

On the legacy **Site Analysis** screen, one trade area applies to the whole search, set through the selector in the top bar. See [Site Analysis](/site-analysis-legacy/site-analysis.md).

***

## Ring

A fixed distance in miles from the anchor. Decimal values work, so 0.75 or 1.5 miles are both valid.

Rings are the fastest way to hold methodology constant across a lot of sites. They ignore road networks and barriers, so a 1-mile ring around a site split by a river covers ground no customer can reach.

**When to use a ring:**

* Screening many sites against one consistent criterion
* Standardized reporting for committee presentations
* Markets where your organization already has an established standard

***

## Walk and Drive Times

Travel-time boundaries follow the road network, accounting for speed limits and geographic barriers. Set a mode of walking or driving and a value from 1 to 60 minutes.

### Understanding Isochrones

A travel-time boundary is an isochrone. Unlike a circle, its shape reflects how people actually reach the site. A 15-minute drive from a suburban site with highway access covers far more ground than 15 minutes from a dense urban corner in traffic.

Two sites with identical ring populations can have very different drive-time populations. That gap is usually the most useful thing an isochrone tells you.

**When to use walk or drive times:**

* Evaluating accessibility from surrounding neighborhoods
* Comparing sites with different road network characteristics
* Urban retail where walking traffic is significant

***

## Foot Traffic Zones

A foot traffic zone is built from observed visitor data rather than an assumption about distance. It shows where a location's visitors actually come from.

Anonymized mobile location data identifies the home and work locations of people who visited the area, aggregated into geographic zones so no individual is identifiable.

### Coverage Percentage

A slider from 50% to 100% controls how much of the visitor base the zone includes.

| Setting  | What you get                                                                            |
| -------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **50%**  | The core area where the most frequent visitors originate — tight and high-concentration |
| **80%**  | A broader area covering most of the customer base                                       |
| **100%** | The full geographic spread of all visitors                                              |

### Visitor Origin

* **Live** — where visitors reside
* **Work** — where visitors are employed

Switching between the two reveals different patterns. A downtown lunch spot may draw heavily from nearby offices, while an evening restaurant pulls from residential neighborhoods.

### Reading the Result

Foot traffic zones display as shaded regions, often with color gradients for visitor density. The boundaries are irregular rather than clean, because they follow real patterns: highway corridors, neighborhood edges, geographic barriers.

Demographics inside a foot traffic zone reflect only the population within that shape. Absolute numbers often come out lower than a comparable ring. The trade-off is precision — you're measuring people who visit, not everyone who lives nearby.

**When to use a foot traffic zone:**

* Validating an assumption about where customers come from
* Learning an unfamiliar market
* Sites where drive-time assumptions don't hold, like urban cores and destination retail

{% hint style="info" %}
Not every location has foot traffic data. If a site has no visitor tracking coverage — common for new developments or areas outside typical retail patterns — a **No foot traffic data for this location** message appears. Try a ring or drive-time trade zone instead.
{% endhint %}

***

## What the Trade Zone Affects

| Analysis                        | How the trade zone changes it                                                         |
| ------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Demographics**                | Population statistics are calculated for residents inside the boundary                |
| **Competitors and Complements** | Only businesses inside the zone are displayed and counted                             |
| **Sales Forecast**              | Analog models factor zone characteristics into the comparison against existing stores |
| **Cannibalization**             | Overlap is measured between zone boundaries                                           |

Changing the zone mid-analysis is worth doing deliberately. Comparing a 10-minute and a 20-minute drive time shows how much of a site's potential depends on reach.

***

## Best Practices

**Start from your standard.** Use your workspace default to set a baseline, then adjust when a site warrants a closer look.

**Match the method to the context.** Drive times for suburban and highway-adjacent sites, walk times for urban retail, foot traffic zones when you need ground truth.

**Compare candidates on the same method.** A 10-minute drive time and a 1-mile ring aren't comparable. Hold the method constant and only then compare the numbers.

**Write down which method you used.** When you share analysis or present to a committee, the zone definition is part of the finding.

For the metrics measured inside a zone, see [Demographics](/data-and-analytics/demographics.md), [Vehicle Traffic](/data-and-analytics/vehicle-traffic.md), [Cannibalization](/data-and-analytics/cannibalization.md), and [Competitors and Complements](/data-and-analytics/competitors-and-complements.md).


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