New York SBDC Research Network

From eMarketer.Retail According to a March 2018 survey of US B2C retail executives by 451 Research, commissioned by Adyen, 78% of respondents said they're considering cashless stores that only accept credit cards and other digital payment options. In contrast, 36% of operations managers, essentially those that are more involved with the customer journey day to day, were in agreement. And their differing views don't stop there. Retail executives were more likely (81%) to say they saw an increase in customers using their mobile devices while shopping in-store—either for coupons, payments or product information—than operations managers (53%). In theory, cashless stores may reduce friction at checkout, which is often caused by long lines

Obtained From:  eMarketer After an unexpectedly strong holiday season closed the door on 12 months of "retail apocalypse" headlines, the retail industry is showing signs of confidence not seen in a year or more. But the confidence stems from something more than Christmas sales. Rather, the industry appears to have embraced the idea of consumer-centricity and moved on from the mindset of forcing a specific purchasing journey. “There is [a] building confidence that the industry is now pivoting” away from separate silos for in-store and digital sales, said Carrie Ask, executive vice president of global retail at  Levi Strauss & Co. , during a panel at Shoptalk in Las Vegas. “We don’t think of it as either/or anymore—it’s just shopping.” This was echoed by others at Shoptalk. Ken Worzel, president of  Nordstrom 's ecommerce site, said the department store is moving away from separating its ecommerce and brick-and-mortar business because the fragmented perspecti...

Obtained from:   eMarketer One of the most significant changes is that, as the global financial crisis recedes in memory, consumers tend to be less focused on saving. In 2010, 70% of respondents said they were increasingly looking for ways to save money. That number has gradually dwindled down to a low of 40%.  The McKinsey survey also probed attitudes among those who said their buying behavior changed last year. It found that there was a rough split between those who said they tended to have shifted toward purchasing private-label or less-expensive brands, and those who said they had tended to trade up to more expensive purchases. The results indicate more buoyant spending patterns than some other recent surveys. For instance, an  IRI  survey from Q3 2017 found that 65% of US internet users said they anticipated purchasing more private-label products in the future.  

From eMarketing : Returns are a big thing for consumers. So much so that many avoid shopping at retailers that have strict return policies in place. In fact, more than half of US internet users surveyed by coupon and discount website Promocodes.com last November agreed that they avoid such places, while over a quarter of respondents agreed strongly. When it comes to various return policy options, many consumers look for the same thing. For example, when shopping in-store, 37.9% of those polled said getting a full refund—not just an exchange or store credit—was their most important return-related concern. Almost as many consumers (33.6%) felt the same way with regard to digital shopping.

From  Bureau Of Labor Statistics This Consumer Expenditure Survey (CE) Annual Report presents integrated data from the 2015 Diary and Interview portions of the CE, including data tables. The tables show average expenditures, income, and characteristics for consumer units 1  classified by the following characteristics: quintiles and deciles of income, before-tax income class, age of the reference person, size of the consumer unit, composition of the consumer unit, number of earners, housing tenure and type of area (urban or rural), region of residence, occupation, highest education level of any consumer-unit member, race, and Hispanic or Latino origin. This report highlights spending patterns for 2015 from the CE, including a brief discussion of expenditure changes for the year, and provides a description of the CE survey. Consumer spending increased 4.6 percent in 2015, according to annual data from the CE. This follows an increase of 4.7 percent in 2014, previously r...