design:retail - July 2014 - (Page 38)

shopper insights 038 The Millennial Male RICHARD WINTER PRESIDENT, POPAI rwinter@popai.com @popaihq M ILLENNIALS ARE ONE of the most desirable shopper segments at the moment. They're highly loyal, influential and vocal. Once you attract them, you see the beneﬁts. The only caveat is that they are complex when it comes to shopping behaviors. One study says this, while another study says that. All data probably is true in some way or another, but POPAI dove deeper into this segment to look at one demographic who is truly "on trend." After this year's "Dad's Sixth Sense" Super Bowl ad from Hyundai, marketing to men became the next challenge for brand marketers. The commercial appealed to men and showcased how involved they are with the raising of their children. It was well received (Marketing Charts ranked it No. 2 for the most eﬀective Super Bowl ad) and agencies started to think maybe they should be developing more campaigns for men. According to Mintel, more than half of men ages 18-64 claim to be the primary grocery shopper in their household. We are seeing a shift of traditional gender roles, so Millennial men are quite an interesting group to study. With all of this in mind, we took a look at our Shopper Engagement Study Series, and picked out four interesting facts about the Millennial male (ages 18-34) in the grocery and mass merchant channels. 1. While shopping, Millennial men do not live by the proverbial phrase, "Don't judge a book by its cover." Product packaging can be just as important as the quality of the product. According to our 2014 Mass Merchant Study, Millennial men substituted their purchases because the product appealed to them. We are not 100 percent sure what exactly appealed to them, but there are studies showing materials used, images, colors, shapes, etc. are all important for your product when it comes to Millennial shoppers. JULY 2014 DESIGNRETAILONLINE.COM For example, according to SymphonyIRI Group Market Advantage, soup sales have increased after a 10-year decline, because of brands oﬀering other packaging options than cans-Campbell's came out with "GoSoups" in pouches and Paciﬁc Foods and Soupman have "retortable" carton packaging. Volume sales for soups in cartons went up 22 percent since 2009, with dollar sales up 14 percent. Also in 2012, Brand Amplitude conducted research on packaging preferences for Milliennials (deﬁned as ages 24-35 in this study), and discovered that they perceive the most important beneﬁts of carton "retortable" packaging to be that it is healthier, keeps food tasting fresher and is easy to recycle. Millennials are interested in a product that is out of the norm and that works toward a cause, so if you are able to appeal to either of those factors in the packaging, the Millennial male will more likely pick that product. 2. They're not as thrifty as the media portrays them to be. Outlets are reporting that Millennials have fewer credit cards, have more in savings and are becoming more frugal-but at POPAI, we find they aren't taking all the measures available to save money. Our 2014 study shows that 68 percent of Millennial men do not use pre-store media, such as newspapers, store circulars, coupons, electronics services or TV advertisements to help plan for shopping trips. They could be saving more money each trip by using coupons or daily sales. 3. Another fact to debunk their portrayed thriftiness and showrooming is their tendency toward impulse buys. In 2012, we found that 50 percent of Millennial men's grocery purchases were unplanned. This year, 53 percent of mass merchant purchases were unplanned. We in the in-store marketing industry believe it is due to the inﬂuence of displays. Something is leading these shoppers to pick up an unplanned item. 4. Mobile use in-store has increased. This isn't that much of a surprise, but seeing an increase from 17 percent to 35 percent in two years shows the increasing role of mobile. The more insightful information is that of the 35 percent of Millennial males who used their phones in-store, more than a quarter of them used it for shopping purposes, such as price comparisons. Since Millennial men are such interesting shoppers, we wanted to add one more fun fact: Disney was the most mentioned brand with the highest conversion rate in our 2014 Mass Merchant Study. Although the sample size was low, it's still interesting to see through our unique methodology of pre- and post-interviews that men ages 18-34 knew they were going to buy Disney. Another fun fact-all of them were single. RICHARD WINTER IS THE PRESIDENT OF POPAI, THE GLOBAL ASSOCIATION FOR MARKETING AT RETAIL, AN INFORMATION SOURCE FOR BRAND MARKETERS, RETAILERS, PRODUCERS AND SUPPLIERS. FIND OUT MORE AT POPAI.COM. Photo courtesy of THINKSTOCK http://www.POPAI.COM http://www.DESIGNRETAILONLINE.COM

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of design:retail - July 2014

design:retail - July 2014
Contents
Editor’s Note
Show Talk
On Trend
We Love This!
Designer Picks
Innovation
Postcard
Inspirations
Have You Heard?
Mingle
Shopper Insights
Shopping With Paco
Walmart
Macy's
Student Window Challenge New York
Fixture Leaders
Products
Backstory

design:retail - July 2014