‘New and lasting habits’: Singapore’s online shopping surge to persist after COVID-19
Many Singaporean consumers had shifted their purchasing behavior from offline to online shopping as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, and experts had predicted that this shift would be a long-lasting one with effects long past the outbreak.
According to data from data analytics firm Nielsen, 37% of Singaporean consumers had increased online shopping activities since the COVID-19 outbreak, and over three-quarters (76%) had already indicated that they would not return to pre-outbreak online shopping levels.
Some 70% of consumers opted to shop online to stock pantries with FMCG items such as packaged foods and beverages, and 69% of those who had bought these goods online for the first time during COVID-19 were already planning to do so again within the next 12 months.
“The convenience and accessibility to products online, especially during COVID-19, have not only increased existing online shoppers' spend but also converted many offline shoppers to online. This trend is unlikely to return to pre-COVID status,” Nielsen Executive Director of Consumer Insights Garick Kea told FoodNavigator-Asia.