The complex consumer

Satisfying multiple desires

Compared with a few years ago we are facing a new and more complex consumer whose demands may shift radically according to time, place and occasion.

It should come as no surprise that consumers’ demands are becoming more complex. In an information rich, time poor, health aware and increasingly regulated society, consumers know what they want, and also what they ought to want. They recognise that these two are not always the same thing, and in the course of a busy day they may find a variety of ways to reconcile a range of sometimes conflicting needs and preferences.

As a result, four distinct market drivers have emerged in the food and drink market over the past new years, and look likely to continue in the near future:

• Health and wellbeing
• Indulgence
• Ethical and environment
• Convenience

Success in the soft drinks market depends on identifying and responding quickly to changing consumer desires. But with so many separate – and seemingly contradictory – drivers developing at once, it is harder than ever to tailor products to specific consumer groups. Not least because consumers themselves are increasingly hard to pigeonhole. In the course of the day, their focus can swing from one of those four trends to any of the others.

This is a recurring theme. We’ll come back to it in The triple-decker shopper. What’s clear is that an individual consumer is increasingly unlikely to maintain the same characteristics all day, all week, or on all occasions. Today people are more inclined than ever to play different roles, and adopt different values, according to time, place and mood.

With that in mind, let’s revisit those four dominant consumer trends. They’re not as discrete as they might appear. In fact, marketers have been adept at combining them in a variety of permutations. While indulgence may seem incompatible with health, for example, brands like Innocent have proved you can satisfy both desires at once.

Propositions that address multiple drivers have fared particularly well – although it’s clearly important that all attributes should be a natural fit, as any brand that tries to stretch too far risks weakening its core message and alienating its consumer base. In 2007 70% of the top 10 launches tapped into more than one of these four consumer trends.

And which trends are the strongest? Of the year’s top 20 new launches, 18 offered a perceived health benefit, while nine were classified as indulgent products.

View Top 20 new product innovations in 2007 classified according to dominant trends