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Generation Z and In-Store Shopping: Young People Face Difficulties When Shopping in Physical Stores and Therefore Prefer the Convenience of Online Shopping.
Hundreds of young people from the Generation Z face difficulties when making in-store purchases, increasingly opting for the comfort of the online environment. Raised in a digitalized world, these new adults have adopted different ways to consume products and services, making interactions in physical stores a real challenge. But why has the shopping experience in traditional establishments become an obstacle for this generation? In this article, we highlight the reasons behind this phenomenon and how it is transforming retail.
Understand the Difficulties in In-Store Purchases and Challenges of Generation Z
While many young adults aged 20 to 25 begin to dive into tasks like paying taxes, as well as allocating money for gas or household services, avoiding online shopping and going to a physical store has become a daunting task. Apparently, difficulties in in-store shopping occur due to a lack of knowledge.
To exemplify Generation Z and in-store shopping, a 24-year-old woman from Zaragoza, Spain, shared a video on her TikTok account, where she expressed her fear of buying at a butcher shop. Rather than being negative, the comments are full of jokes and testimonials from people who feel embarrassed and are struggling with in-store purchases because they don’t know how to interact in a market.
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No matter the place, it is simply difficult for them to know what to do or what to ask. Highlighting the challenges of Generation Z, some shared how they ended up buying items like a whole salmon or a quarter of chorizo simply because they saw others doing it.
Internet Users Comment on Difficulties in In-Store Shopping
According to one user, explaining about Generation Z and in-store purchases, at the fish market, she didn’t know that salmon was sold whole. Thus, she asked for a salmon thinking it was one kilogram and received the whole fish, which totaled R$ 390. As she was embarrassed, she didn’t say anything to him and took it with her. Once, she saw someone buy a quarter of chorizo, thought the amount was good, and since then, buys a quarter of everything.
Similarly, a young woman shared her experience at a specialty butcher shop, where, upon asking for 50 grams of cheese, she received only one slice. Thus, she left with her slice of cheese quietly out of embarrassment.
This phenomenon regarding Generation Z and in-store purchases shows how young people face difficulties when shopping in physical stores, leading them to spend almost half of their total expenditures on online shopping, while older adults allocate less than 10% to this type of purchase.
Moreover, at least 43% prefer to buy directly from brands due to trust and safety issues. This trend also reflects other challenges faced by Generation Z, such as interpersonal communication. Young people, accustomed to interacting via text messages and avoiding phone calls, struggle to ask simple questions to salespeople in stores about the right quantity of a product.
Understand Why Online Shopping is Easier for Generation Z
The CEO of Petina, Rodrigo Garcia, explains that, being digital natives, technology is a natural extension of these young people’s lives, who possess great skill in handling multiple tasks simultaneously. However, it has been noted that Millennials still prefer the convenience of the internet for shopping, using different devices, unlike Generation Z, which primarily uses smartphones.
Generation Z and in-store shopping are also explained by data from the Brazilian Electronic Commerce Association (ABComm), which states that e-commerce in Brazil grew by 27% in the last year, generating around R$ 186 billion.
Source: Exame
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