McKinsey recently announced the results of a study entitled How the recession changed consumer behavior, in which they claim that the recession has caused a lasting preference shift of consumers towards more basic products in a sector they call consumer packaged goods (e.g., beer and allergy medicine). Maybe I should be pleased, because basic products tend to be more usable, an effect that people at Nokia called the usability knee. But I am not so happy, because McKinsey's conclusion seems to be stretching it a bit.

A fundamental change in consumer preference?
First, let's take a look at the central claim of the study:

Of the consumers who switched to cheaper products, 46 percent said they performed better than expected, and the large majority of these consumers said the performance of such products was much better than expected. As a result, 34 percent of the switchers said they no longer preferred higher-priced products, and an additional 41 percent said that while they preferred the premium brand, it “was not worth the money.”

So, what do the researchers base this claim on? Well, on - and I quote - "new McKinsey research". However, to be able to read what new McKinsey research is you need a premium subscription to the McKinsey Quarterly (previously I ran into a similar issue with a study by Accenture). However, based on phrases such as "...46 percent said they performed better than expected...", I suspect we are talking about a questionnaire-based study. Being a PhD candidate, I don't have the budget for a premium membership for the McKinsey Quarterly, so I'm going to give myself some room to speculate here. I might be wrong, but hey, maybe then McKinsey should have disclosed how they performed their research. So bear with me while I release my Psychology 101 knowledge on McKinsey's study.

Post-decision dissonance
The survey results showed that people reported to have bought cheaper products, and reported that they actually liked them. And when asked whether they would continue to buy these simpler products the response of a large groups was: yes. So basically the line of reasoning was this:

1. The recession caused people to buy cheaper products
2. Cheaper products are more basic
3. Consumers liked these basic products
4. They will keep buying them, even when the recession ends

That people bought cheaper products makes sense. It's a recession, we are all on a tighter budget. Well, maybe not so much if you're working at Goldman Sachs, but for us mere mortals, it's a matter of tightening the belt. So, to deal with this tighter budget we buy cheaper products. And cheaper products tend to be more basic. And then we try them, and it turns out we actually like them. Now we get to my point: people always tend to like what they have bought. Regardless. The phenomenon is called post-decision dissonance (the consumer version of cognitive dissonance): we rationalize ourselves into feeling good about about a decision we made or had to make. In a recession you hear people saying things like: "You know, evenings at home can be wonderful. You spend the night cooking together, you watch a good movie. You don't have to go out to have a good time." That does not mean they will not go out and eat in restaurants if they once again have the money for it. It just means they don't want to feel bad about not going out.

People want to be consistent
Now back to the results of the study in which McKinsey reported that: '34 percent of the switchers said they no longer preferred higher-priced products, and an additional 41 percent said that while they preferred the premium brand, it “was not worth the money."' Based on the wording ('said') I again assume the source of this was a question in the survey. This seemingly led to the conclusion that "it may also have fundamentally altered the behavior of numerous US consumers, who are now learning to live without expensive products". The 'learning' part is in line with previous research that showed that non-quantifiable product qualities - such as quality of use - are communicated best by experiencing the product. However, the aforementioned conclusion was based on a survey in which the line of questioning led to this 'dialogue' with the participants:

• You said you bought more basic products
• You said you actually liked them
• Now, in the future, do you think you will continue to like them?

In other words: do you think in the future your behavior will be consistent with what you've just told me? And we want to be viewed as consistent (see heuristic #5 'be consistent'). So the answer is likely to be skewed towards: "Yes, I will keep buying these basic products."

No 'fundamental' change
So, to sum it all up, I don't think the newfound preference of consumers for basic products is 'fundamental' and thus lasting. Instead of McKinsey's line of reasoniong, I would like to propose the following one:

1. People defend their choices
2. The recession caused people to buy cheaper products
3. Cheaper products are more basic
4. People liked the products, because they want to like what they buy
5. People want to be viewed as consistent, so they will say they will continue to buy basic products
6. Some people may keep buying basic products but there's no guarantee

More posts on consumer preference and simplicity:
> Defeating feature fatigue
> Don Norman: Simplicity is highly overrated
> Simplicity: functionally and visually
> When simplicity wins over features: Philips DirectLife

[Photo: Wootang01]