Unique Consumer Insights

Trend - Restaurants are offering Halloween-themed meals and items with unique appeal. These items often come at discounted prices to help parents and children, while they feature items with spooky-themed designs to enhance Halloween celebrations. These meals are designed to be positive experiences for fans.

Insight - In North America, Halloween is one of children's favorite holidays due to fun decorations, costumes, and free candy. However, Halloween has evolved to be more than simply a day-of trick-or-treating celebration, with many businesses offering celebratory items as early as a month before the day itself. Consumers who enjoy Halloween celebrations gravitate toward businesses that offer such items to engage with the holiday, build excitement, and save money for their families.

Trend - ADHD chairs are designed to support movement and focus by providing subtle stimulation. These features help concentration and alertness, addressing the challenges faced by many with ADHD in maintaining focus, especially in environments that require prolonged periods of sitting, such as classrooms and offices.

Insight - The growing recognition of ADHD is part of a broader push towards inclusivity and the creation of spaces designed for diverse needs, with the goal of challenging conventional standards. This reflects a societal embrace of neurodiversity, with the understanding that customizing environments can significantly help communities that have been mainly underserved. As advocacy for neurodiversity grows, brands have a golden opportunity to pioneer in neuro-inclusive design, paving the way for spaces that are both more equitable and effective.

Trend - As the COVID-19 vaccine becomes more accessible across North America, brands are launching commemorative pieces that users can wear to celebrate their vaccination. These range from shirts to dresses.

Insight - The COVID-19 pandemic has dramatically altered the way of life for most individuals. As hope for a return to "normal" comes into the horizon, consumers are looking to celebrate with specialized products that serve as a visual reminder of this anticipation. Brands that help commemorate these special moments will win consumer loyalty.

Trend - While our capacity for mass space travel is still years away, brands are offering consumers a taste of outer space through products that are partially or fully made in space. Be it a cookie or a pair of boots, these goods satiate shoppers looking to indulge their sense of individuality.

Insight - Space travel is an ambitious project that has captured the attention of many consumers who are rooting for innovation and human progress. Individuals are interested in the novelty of this concept and often internalize it as part of their personal brand. As a result, they become vastly engaged in products and services that bring them closer to knowing and experiencing outer space, while also allowing them to show off their future-forward mindset.

Implications - In an effort to engage in more wellness-driven practices, some consumers are increasingly drawn to what were once New-Age practices for their elements of ritual and spirituality. The growing interest in ritual-based practices like meditation and witchcraft in North America comes as many consumers face excess and uncertainty in their daily lives, which is coupled with their increased prioritization of self-care.

Implications - Alcohol brands are attempting to regain loyalty lost to the recent Millennial preference for sober socialization by converging unexpected flavors within the alcohol category. While these flavors might not appeal to the masses, for Millennial foodies or die-hard fans, products like vodka-flavored beer serve as a shareable and novel experience.

Implications - While blockchain technology is still in its infancy, its application in voting means that we can almost guarantee security while allowing for increased participation for remote legally registered voters. With electoral fraud being highly scrutinized as of late, blockchain technology has the potential to provide a foundation where institutions can work to restore faith in electoral systems, and could contribute to more accessible voting processes.

Implications - As the Gen Z and Millennial generations downsize homes and reduce physical commodities, items of sentimental value are transitioning to digital formats. Today’s consumers no longer see the value in displaying figurines or storing memorabilia passed on from previous generations, but would rather preserve moments via digital storage to ensure safe keeping and ease of access, in keeping with the digitization of data and information.

Implications - While products like insect repellents provide consumers with a straight-forward method of protection, troublesome application often prevents consumers from adopting such products into their lifestyle. Seeking to make the process more enjoyable, brands are adding components of play and interaction to make repellents more gratifying for the consumer. Integrating repellents into arts and crafts and motorcycle accessories, brands are using unexpected activities to bring an element of surprise and delight to the process. The use of such interactive components suggest a growing consumer need for entertainment, even when it comes to one’s health.

Implications - Realizing the growing importance of individuality among modern consumers, public events like festivals are evolving to tailor to more niche interests. Moving beyond concerts and musical entertainment, festivals are putting a greater emphasis on everything from religion to sexual orientation to customized experiences. This shift toward hyper-targeted events reflect a growing need for specialization, particularly in the entertainment industry.