Consumer Must Buy List
Japan's Most Wanted Consumer Goods....even in a recession
by Hisakazu Matsuda
With Japan's mainstay automotive and consumer electronics industries experiencing great difficulties these days, you would think consumers would have other worries besides how to get their hands on the next big "must have" item on their shopping list. Yet Japanese product makers are keeping ahead of the desire curve by rolling out ever more interesting products. To keep up with changing short-list of consumer must-haves, JMR recently conducted a survey asking consumers about their next big purchase, focusing on clothing, furniture, imported brands and personal electronics. A 1,000 plus sample of Tokyo metro consumers was polled in late January 2009. It covers shopping experience, purchase intention of 18 kinds of commodities which are already available in the market as well as 10 kinds of products which will be available in the market in the near to mid-term.
Of those polled, two-thirds (67%) indicated that they had bought at least one of the products on our list. Among items on the list, six had been purchased by over 10% of consumers. The top spot goes to Uniqlo clothing items (49%), followed by Shimamura clothing items (16%), both of which are inexpensive fashion brands. Nintendo DS (the handheld gaming platform) at 13% is the third most-purchased item. After that, comes the Nintendo-Wii, the new gaming console from Nintendo (11%), and items from Nitori (10%), a furniture and interior brand chain.
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For purchase intention, the survey shows 55% of people have no intention of purchasing anything on our list -- not a big surprise given the current economic situation -- and only 6 items tempted more than 5% of respondents into indicating purchase intent, that is to say more than 5% of polled consumers were only seriously considering a purchase of these 6 items. As the chart here shows, those "must have no matter what" items are Uniqlo clothing items, (27%), hybrid cars (12%), electro luminescence televisions (9%), Shimamura clothing (9%), other clothing brands (8%), Nitori furniture, and interior goods (5%). Game consoles were not in the top six spots.
Learning from the numbers
In part based on the study, for the duration of the current recession we expect that several features will drive people's purchasing habits. First, the higher buying rate accompanied by lower purchase intentions suggest a stagnant economy. Second, three of the six most wanted items are clothes--two of them well-known discount brands. However it would be a mistake to say that clothing's position is based on cheap price alone: new function additions were prominent in driving demand. Uniqlo's "heat tech" line of moisture wicking/heat retaining casual clothing and underwear are a good example. Finally, environmentally friendly electronics are also gaining market share. Examples here are hybrid cars, TV displays based on low-power consumption EL technology and high-power electric bicycles.
Clothing makers show the way
The results clearly show that the clothing industry is doing well because of their new "high tech" clothes and avoidance of competing on price. Car and electronics makers would do well to follow the apparel makers' lead in innovating if they want to attract new customers.
(A Japanese version of this article appeared in the April 2009 issue of the magazine
Hitachi Square.)
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