Question

You don’t need experts to see that any business serving the public is in trouble. By the end of 2019, many retail analysts and consultants were already speculating which retailers would fail next, especially given their already weakened positions from growing shifts in consumer behaviour favouring e-commerce for greater selection, convenience and pricing. Then the COVID-19 shutdown hit Canada, and it became clear the coronavirus and e-commerce would begin to reshape the industry and consumers. That transformation didn’t take long, coupled with the fear of catching the virus, consumer behaviours have been reshaped. After weeks of working at home, isolation, social distancing, a higher level of hygiene, wearing masks, and keeping up with the news on the virus, we are all sensitized. Many retail stores, big and small, have liquidity issues, financially most operate on a weekly or monthly basis. Even if a retailer qualified for government assistance, it may not survive. For any business to have a robust rebound it will need pre-pandemic consumer demand. Every non-essential business is in the same situation, they are closed, waiting at the same starting line for the race to begin, with zero sales and uncertainty about the future. All will be fighting for that small amount of daring customer traffic, but not all consumers will be freely shopping. That means businesses will be faced with a financial endurance test waiting for demand.

How COVID-19 has changed the consumer behaviour, do you think that consumer behaviour will come back to pre-Covid level or will result in a permanent shift in the behaviour in defining aggregate demand. Click on the link at the top of this page to be directed to the discussion forum.

Answer 1

Ans: COVID-19 has brought significant change in customer mind setup. it has redefined the priority of a customer. before this pandemic sanitization is a fashionable word or a word associated with rich people, but after COVID-19 it shows a drastic change in mind setup of customers and also followed by the retailer along with e-commerce platform. Now everyone is more concerned about sanitization and personal health care. it slows down some of the businesses and promotes side business like a mask, sanitizer i.e (different types of sanitizers and other hygiene-related products. So this pandemic taught many things to the market related to the change in the situation as well as the necessary action according to the situations.

So now we can discuss the after pandemic situation where the things will be expected to be normalized and again the retail market and some of the product market will regain its importance. so if we will project the market situation it will follow the present norms like sanitization and hygiene along with social distancing and personal healthcare. So this part will continue as a habit to the individual.

if we will discuss the e-commerce and retail market it will gain its business once again but maybe some changes in the consumption pattern and the demand for e-commerce will be more. here the customer don't want to visit stores for their product due to the fear of pandemic and also every retail will follow the pattern of home delivery like e-commerce. so it will promote the teleshopping for the local retailer and for the nationwide market it will follow the brands' online basis. now one positive feature can be figured that the sale will be focused more online rather than offline or the store visit and the mall or departmental store business will be slow down gradually.

So finally if we will discuss the shifting of aggregate demand then yes there will be a permanent shifting in aggregate demand but definitely not the one which is prevailing in this pandemic situations.