THE titbit about regional underwear buying habits will probably draw the most attention. Welsh women are especially partial to red lingerie while north-westerners go in for thongs and G-strings. But there is more to be learned than that about the state of Britain and of the retail industry from John Lewis’s first report on its customers’ shopping habits, published today. The main thing is that under pressure of recession and a halting recovery, Britons have become both more tradition-minded and more individualistic.
There seems to be a national yearning for cosiness. Sales of board games like Bananagrams (a Scrabble-like game) are up 17% on last year. Baking is in: John Lewis sold 29% more bread makers and 70% more cooling racks in the past year. Despite the ubiquity of smartphone cameras, photo frames (and expensive cameras) are in demand. Christmas shoppers lean toward artificial trees (sales were up 40% last year), in part because prices of real ones have risen. But they are coming back to traditional trimmings like candy canes. “A British Christmas wasn’t about those things for ten years,” says Paula Nickolds, the chain’s buying director.
Disposable “fast fashion” is falling out of favour; things that last and have a pedigree are coming in. Men are in an Edwardian mood: Harris Tweed and waistcoats (whose sales nearly doubled) are in fashion and beard oil is again in stock after a long absence. Women are buying more pearls and satin gloves (up 109%). In furniture one traditional purchase--the three-piece suite of matching armchairs and a sofa--is “almost dead,” says Ms Nickolds. But knockoffs of modernist classics, like the Barcelona chair, are popular.
Nostalgic though they are, John Lewis’s customers increasingly want to put their own stamp on things. Its new way of selling sofas tries to accommodate this. Before, shoppers would have to choose from whatever the department stores happened to stock. Now the retailer offers 40 shapes and some 400 coverings, which shoppers can combine as they like. Ms Nickolds expects that sort of customisation to spread to clothing.
John Lewis is not as upper middle class as its reputation, which is why it thinks the buying habits of its customers mirror the country’s: 42% have a household income of less than £30,000 ($48,000) and 39% are younger than 34. They seem to spend their waking hours shopping. Roused by smartphone alarms, they browse by phone in the early mornings, shift to desktops as they arrive at work and shop by tablet in the evenings, especially during ad breaks on television shows. Knickers aside, Britons mostly shop as one country, united by appalling and unpredictable weather. For 80% of items, there is little regional variation in what they buy.
