Shop to be merry, spend to impress: The youth’s mantra on consumerism

There rise of consumerism among the country’s young people can no longer be denied, with purchases driven by a keenness to make an impression on others, and the brand becoming the most important attribute of a product.

As much as 37.3% of the respondents in the latest Youth Survey by HT and MaRS admit they sometimes buy things they do not need to impress people, and 62.1% say they paid a high price for the brand name when buying their last smartphone. About half the men, and a little more than half the women say brands and products form a topic of conversations with their friends.

Not just that, 40.7% women say they have more clothes than they need, and 32.4% say they always have more than one lipstick. That can be forgiven, if one is allowed to get away with a dash of sexism, but men are not to be left behind in this area. As much as 35.9% of them say they have more clothes than they need, and 28.3% say they always have more than one deodorant.

The picture becomes a bit hazy from here on. A third of both men and women say they switch brands all the time. Yet, about two-thirds of both genders say their last smartphone acquisition was of the same brand as their previous one. This despite the fact that 60.8% of the men and 67.2% of the women say they chose their last mobile phone brand after a lot of thought.

So that is a feather in the cap for brand power, taking us back to the earlier point that the brand name has become a product’s strongest suit. And this is where advertising comes in. As much as 39.6% of the men say they have bought many things because they liked the advertisement, a view shared by 36% of the women.

Expectedly, advertising played a critical role in smartphone purchases. As much as 91% of the men found the advertising for the smartphone they bought to be either good or the best. This was true for 87.1% of the women.

Read more stories from HT MaRS Youth Survey here.