Consumer Attitudes & Behavior

Consumers are shopping online more than ever before, and are especially fond of one particular platform to support the activity.

According to the comScore “2016 U.S. Cross-Platform Future in Focus” report from comScore, desktop and mobile digital commerce accounted for 15% of U.S. consumer spending in the fourth quarter of 2015. This was up from 12.5% the same quarter a year earlier and also represented an all-time high percentage.

Macy’s CEO and other top executives are feeling the pain of the chain’s disappointment financial performance in 2015.
   
The board decided to award no bonuses after the chain fell short of its sales, cash flow and earnings goals, Macy’s said in a regulatory filing, according to Bloomberg.

Click here for more.

“Now Trending” is an exclusive online series to chainstoreage.com, featuring trending topics that impact the retail real estate landscape.

For retail analysts and consumers alike, what’s going on in the apparel sector is fascinating and, in fact, confounding. While the root causes may not seem exactly crystal clear, the implications will be clear and unambiguous.

A few months after Whole Foods Market and The Fresh Market initiated price-cutting strategies to lure more shoppers, Trader Joe's has apparently followed suit, according to a new report.

New data from Deutsche Bank indicates that prices on 77 similar items at a New York-based Trader Joe's store and nearby Whole Foods found that Trader Joe's was about 26% cheaper, a decrease from a similar analysis Deutsche Bank did in 2013.

Consumers are shopping online more than ever before, and are especially fond of one particular platform to support the activity.

According to the comScore “2016 U.S. Cross-Platform Future in Focus” report from comScore, desktop and mobile digital commerce accounted for 15% of U.S. consumer spending in fourth quarter 2015. This was up from 12.5% the same quarter a year earlier and also represented an all-time high percentage.

The plus-size market is being reenergized by a new demographic.

Teenage females in the United States are changing when it comes to the types of clothing sizes they are purchasing, according to the 2015 Women’s Special Sizes Study from The NPD Group.

If the major suppliers of soft goods such as clothing and accessories to retail stores are a bellwether of the economy, then the coming months are looking to provide a jolt as 75% of these suppliers expect retail sales to significantly outpace the gross domestic product for the spring and summer shopping season.

That’s one of the major findings of a new survey conducted by Capital Business Credit.

When it comes to buying products, consumers are particular about who and what they trust to get advice.

According to a survey of nearly 14,000 adults conducted in early March by social retail technology provider Collective Bias, Facebook and YouTube are the most persuasive social channels for consumer purchases. About 19% of consumers find Facebook to influence their purchasing decision most, with YouTube coming in second at nearly 18%. YouTube is especially popular with men (23%) compared to women (14%).

Consumers are buying groceries online in increasing numbers, but are following specific trends.

According to a new survey of 12,000 U.S. grocery shoppers conducted by grocery retail consultancy Brick Meets Click and sponsored by SAP hybris, the percentage of U.S. consumers that have purchased groceries online in the past 30 days nearly doubled to 21% in the fourth quarter of 2015 from 11% in 2013. Forty-one percent of consumers have purchased groceries online at some point.

Gen Z and Millennials are big on physical stores — even more so than their older counterparts.

That’s one of the findings of a new research study by insights firm iModerate in which 74% of all respondents said it is important for brands to have a physical location rather than solely selling online. Interestingly, 80% of Gen Zers and 82% of Millennials respondents said it is important, compared to 69% of Gen Xers and 65% of Boomers.