There are many ways in which households have changed in the past 50 years. People today are getting married much older, and although divorce rates had risen significantly by the early 1990s, there has since been a decreasing tendency. Because of the rise in divorce rates, there are many more single-parent households nowadays. In addition, there are more households of same-sex couples and single-person households, and the number of blended families has also increased due to a higher divorce rate.
Consumer behavior models and approaches are relevant in these diverse household structures because what people buy and where is influenced by their family members, the type of household they have, and their role in it. An example of a new tendency in modern households is the preference to stay at home instead of going to a restaurant, a movie theater or any other place. Therefore, products and services that ‘fit’ today’s households are those that appeal to family members’ comfort zones (Hawkins et al., 2020). Some examples of these are food delivery, online clothing stores, and various streaming services. On the other hand, services that fail to meet the realities of household living can be exemplified by businesses that do not manage to make customers’ interaction with service providers an effortless, easy-going experience.
One of the major changes that have affected consumers’ purchasing habits is the increase in single-person households. Thus, studies have shown that people living alone “have the weakest purchasing power of all household types” because they tend to have a lower income compared to couple households (Hodgson, 2019, par. 3). The opportunities for marketers in relation to single households can include targeting these households directly with strategies that might interest live-alone buyers; for example, multi-buy purchases are unlikely to attract them, while price cuts might.
References
Hawkins, D. I., Mothersbaugh, D. L., & Susan Bardi Kleiser. (2020). Consumer behavior: Building marketing strategy. Mcgraw-Hill Education.
Hodgson, A. (2019). How Single Homes Affect Consumer Spending Trends. Euromonitor. Web.