Member Article

UK consumers look to a healthier lifestyle during Covid-19 lockdown, consumer spending shows

UK consumers are looking to take better care of their health during the Covid-19 lockdown, with online sales of sports clothing and nutritional meals increasing dramatically over the past week, technology firm Emarsys can confirm.

Online retailers of sports clothing and nutrition both experienced up to 30% more sales last week year on year, while recipe-box companies saw a whopping 200% rise in sales — driven in part by the likes of Joe Wicks’s online fitness and PE lessons.

These trends were identified by Covid-19 Commerce Insight, a joint project between leading customer engagement platform provider Emarsys and data analytics provider GoodData showing the impact the impact of Covid-19 on consumer confidence.

Alex Timlin, senior vice president of verticals at Emarsys, who has been analysing online spending consumer trends said: “Health is obviously on the top of everyone’s minds at the moment, as we all look to get through the next few months of this pandemic.

“Our data has shown that while consumer spending has slowed because of the closure of physical stores in the UK, it has by no means ground to halt. In fact, in many areas, Covid-19 has had no impact on average consumer spending, and in some areas spending has actually gone up — health and fitness being one of them.”

One of the other product areas experiencing odd growth at the moment is the online sales of washing machines, which last week saw a 200% increase in online sales year on year — possibly as an attempt by consumers to kill germs more effectively and avoid local launderettes. Less surprisingly, online sales of fridges and freezers exploded over the last week by more than 200% as consumers continue to stock up on essential foods during the pandemic.

The tool used by Emarsys to identify these trends draws on more than a billion engagements and 400 million transactions in 120 countries, providing a global and regional picture of ecommerce activity and trends — a key indicator of overall economic conditions in these unprecedented times.

Key insights from Covid-19 Commerce Insight include how the pandemic is affecting the number of online consumer transactions, order numbers, the average order value, types of items purchased and more — in any industry and region in the world — in context of the extraordinary measures taken by governments globally.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Sara Richter .