It is December so it’s time for a lot of looking for guidance into how the next year or so will go.
There are lots of good one’s out there. I sent Pinterest’s 35 trends and 175+ predictions to a client just last week. I love the TikTok made me buy it curated page of products and there are surely going to be a tonne more coming out in the next few days.
However, these consumer trends (via a survey of 3,000 Americans) from Fred Wilson’s blog caught my eye for a few reasons, some of which for the dichotomies in our natures and in our worlds that they revealed. Download and read the whole thing at The New Consumer (and its worth it) but for some highlights which provoked my own thoughts, read on!
First, E-comm (or eComm or ecommerce) is seeing its share of sales continue to grow, but has retrenched a little since the 2020 lock down. It’s still growing but not quite as aggressively as when we couldn’t leave our houses

Secondly however, the cost of online advertising, as observed by Coefficient Capital’s portfolio has increased 200% since the start of this year and 250% since the start of the pandemic. Profitability is leaving the system and the company’s that are benefitting the most aren’t the retailers or producers but Facebook and Google.

This is not a new story by any means but seeing it in stark black and red reminded me of an old client who tied brand strength to cost per conversion (both online and off). The stronger the brand, the lower the acquisition cost – again, something we intuitively understand but sometimes fail to quantify when looking so closely at the trees of online marketing metrics. If you didn’t know it already, b uild a strong brand for lasting benefits.
This was an interesting to see – the prevailing wisdom is that younger consumers are more drawn to brands. That they (are more likely to) gravitate to brands they feel a personal connection to…yet Gen Z, the youngest cohort here, is showing a downward trend – 25% down from the Millennial group. Were Millennials peak consumerists or is that life stage drawn to brands as they make choices that inform the rest of their lives? Something to look at as we all attempt to build/refresh long lasting brands.

One thing that does follow my intuition is that younger generations are more willing to do something they believe will aid the environment, whether its eating a plant-based diet, choosing an electric/hybrid vehicle, and purchasing carbon credits. They’re also more like to rent things vs buying them – but that could be due to their disposable income levels. I was, however surprised to see older respondents being much more likely to recycle.

When it comes to regular purchases, online grocery has not retrenched the boost it got during the lockdown:

And this poses a huge threat to large established brands who see their share of market shrink (in the aggregate) when folks are buying online – product discovery is easier online, especially when DTC brands are more experienced in buying, targeting and optimising digital media (see the FB/Google slide above), and once smaller brands get into a shopping basket, its easy to become a habitual repeat purchase.
…and this trend will be even more important as online grocery adoption increases apace.

This was an incredible stat – more people invested in Ethereum last year than stocks, bonds, options or even Bitcoin…perhaps ETH looks like a bargain at ~$4k CAD compared to BTC at ~$50k CAD. Or perhaps the environment/sustainability concerns continued into investment behaviour.

Or, maybe its a hedge agains the dreaded “i” word which looms large over all our lives.
