February 9th, 2023, Janice Fernandes
As the impact of inflation continues to be felt to varying degrees across the globe, people’s focus on their financial well-being has made them tighten their belts and cut back on expenses. But in which categories have global consumers been most aware of increasing prices, enough to make them want to change brands, shop around, or not buy a product/ service at all?
According to the data from a recent YouGov survey, groceries and utilities (gas, electricity) are the products consumers are most likely to be price conscious of with 55% and 36% respectively of global respondents picking these categories. While only two in ten global respondents say they have been price-conscious about medicine and healthcare products (20%), it’s still on the higher end of the other categories listed in the survey. Consumers are more sensitive to price in healthcare than they are in, for example, electronics, cosmetics, air travel and hotels.
Of the 18 markets surveyed, the proportion varies significantly among different countries.
Poland has the highest percentage of consumers who are price-conscious when purchasing medicine and healthcare products at 38%, but consumers in most other European countries lie below the global average. Great Britain and Denmark, with 9% and 8% respectively, register the lowest percentage of consumers who have either changed the brand, shopped around or didn’t buy the medicine at all. Groceries is where the tables turn, and the European markets land at the top of all markets surveyed - consumers here are most price-conscious when buying groceries.
Consumers in all APAC markets outpace the global audience when it comes to being sensitive to the price of medicines and healthcare products. India is the only country in this region where over a third of consumers (35%) pick medicine and healthcare products.
A quarter of UAE consumers say they’ve been price conscious about medicine and healthcare products in the past six months. Looking at age demographics in UAE, consumers aged between 45-54 years are most likely to be price-conscious about medicine (30%), followed by 18-24-year-olds in the country (28%).
US at 19% joins the European markets registering less than the global audience. Canada registers 21% of consumers who are sensitive to any increase in medicine and healthcare product prices. Mexico (29%) is the third most likely market to be conscious of price in this category.
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Methodology: YouGov Surveys: Serviced provide quick survey results from nationally representative or targeted audiences in multiple markets. The data is based on surveys of adults aged 18+ years in 18 markets with sample sizes varying between 510 and 2044 for each market. All surveys were conducted online in December 2022. Data from each market uses a nationally representative sample apart from Mexico and India, which use urban representative samples, and Indonesia and Hong Kong, which use online representative samples. Learn more about YouGov Surveys: Serviced.
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