Melbourne Institute & Roy Morgan – Taking The Pulse of the Nation: Tax rebates boosted consumption for Australians

Original article by Roy Morgan
Market Research Update – Page: Online : 29-Nov-22

In 2022, tax refunds for Australians with taxable income below $126,000 were expected to be between $675 and $1,500 – a $420 increase from previous years. The Taking the Pulse of the Nation Survey recently asked Australians how they would spend their expected tax refunds. The survey results indicated that about $515 (48%) of the refund was spent on consumption, $318 (27%) on savings and investment, and $246 (22%) on paying existing debts. The response to tax refunds varied with income: those with annual taxable income below $32,000 consumed 50 percent more of their refunds than those with annual taxable income above $100,000. Of interest is whether tax filers’ anticipated consumption coincided with their actual behaviour after the tax refund was received. There is remarkable consistency in what tax filers say they would do with the refund and what they did with it. Policy makers and business might be able to anticipate policy effects by gathering richer data from consumers. This report is based on a total of 2,000 respondents from data collected in May and October 2022. Visit the Melbourne Institute Taking the Pulse of the Nation web portal for further information and to access interactive charts and other findings: https://melbourneinstitute.unimelb.edu.au/data/ttpn.

CORPORATES
ROY MORGAN LIMITED, UNIVERSITY OF MELBOURNE. INSTITUTE OF APPLIED ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL RESEARCH

Good news in store for retail this Christmas – new research

Original article by
Australian Retailers Association – Page: Online : 23-Nov-22

The Christmas Gift Buying Survey has been undertaken by the Australian Retailers Association in collaboration with Roy Morgan. The survey shows that 59% of Australians intend to spend the same or more (12%) on Christmas gifts compared with 2021, despite growing inflationary pressures. It also found that the average gift purchase is $700, down slightly ($26) on last year. Alcohol and food top the list of intended gift purchases for this year, followed by gifts cards and toys. The ARA and Roy Morgan forecast that Australians will spend nearly $64 billion in the lead up to Christmas, up 3% on last year. They also forecast that sales over the four-day Black Friday/Cyber Monday weekend (25 – 28 Nov) will reach a record $6.2 billion.

CORPORATES
AUSTRALIAN RETAILERS ASSOCIATION, ROY MORGAN LIMITED

Consumer spending for the Spring Racing Carnival to reach $1.6 billion

Original article by Roy Morgan
Market Research Update – Page: Online : 28-Oct-22

New research from the Australian Retailers Association in collaboration with Roy Morgan shows that over 1.5 million people plan to attend a Spring Racing Carnival event trackside this year. More than 1.9 million Australians plan to attend events not on the track, such as in restaurants or other hospitality venues. People celebrating the Spring Racing Carnival will spend an average amount of $1,076 on themselves, totalling $1.6 billion in spending. Meanwhile, 52% of people say they are spending the same or more than they did last year on their Spring Racing Carnival celebrations. A new dress or suit is the most common consumer purchase (mentioned by 68% of people planning to attend a Spring Racing Carnival event), followed by a hat/fascinator (35%), a pair of shoes (31%) and jewellery (26%). The ARA-Roy Morgan Snap SMS survey was conducted with an Australia-wide cross-section of 1,694 Australians aged 18+ on Friday September 30 to Tuesday October 4.

CORPORATES
ROY MORGAN LIMITED, AUSTRALIAN RETAILERS ASSOCIATION

Solar Energy Systems on households have more than doubled since 2018 – now at nearly a third of all households (32.3%)

Original article by Roy Morgan
Market Research Update – Page: Online : 19-Oct-22

The latest Roy Morgan research shows that over 3.2 million Australian households (32.3% of all households) owned a Solar Energy System in the year to June 2022, up from only 1.32 million (14%) in the year to June 2018. There were big increases in ownership of Solar Energy Systems in 2019 and 2020, although growth has levelled off over the last two years as the penetration of Solar Energy Systems approached one-third of all households. On a State-by-State basis there are more households in NSW (885,000) with Solar Energy Systems than anywhere else followed by Queensland (756,000), Victoria (728,000), WA (439,000) and SA (332,000). SA and WA have the highest rates of Solar Energy System penetration – over 40% of households. The ownership rates are significantly lower in South-Eastern Australia with under a third of households in Tasmania (30.2%), Victoria (27.7%) and New South Wales (26.6%) owning Solar Energy Systems. A primary reason which explains the lower rates of households with Solar Energy Systems in NSW and Victoria is the higher density living and far higher number (and proportion) of apartments, flats, units, semi-detached terraces and townhouses.

CORPORATES
ROY MORGAN LIMITED

October rate raise could be final straw for lower income spenders

Original article by Emma Koehn
Brisbane Times – Page: Online : 4-Oct-22

Low-income households will come under further pressure if the Reserve Bank of Australia increases the cash rate by another 50 basis points on Tuesday. The latest quarterly consumer survey from UBS shows that low income earners have an "outright negative" financial outlook, although wealthy Australians are expected to keep spending. Australian Retailers Association CEO Paul Zahra notes that the full impact of the recent interest rate increases have yet to flow through the economy, adding that retail sales could soften in coming months.

CORPORATES
RESERVE BANK OF AUSTRALIA, AUSTRALIAN RETAILERS ASSOCIATION

Australian alcohol consumption declines from pandemic highs of 2021, but consumption of RTDs at a record high

Original article by Roy Morgan
Market Research Update – Page: Online : 17-Aug-22

New data from Roy Morgan’s Alcohol Consumption Report shows that 13,603,000 Australians (67.9%) aged 18+ consumed alcohol in an average four-week period in the year to June 2022, down 1.8% from a pandemic high of 13,908,000 (69.7%) a year earlier. The standout alcoholic beverage over the last year as we emerged from the pandemic lockdowns of 2020-21 has been Ready-to-drinks (RTDs); some 3,349,000 Australians (16.7%) consumed RTDs in the year to June, an increase of 3.2% points (+680,000). The most popular alcohol is still wine, but the number of Australians drinking wine fell to 8,938,000 (44.6%), a decrease of 1.7% points (-297,000) from a year ago. Beer has also lost ground from its pandemic highs with 6,666,000 Australians (33.3%) now drinking beer, down 2.3% points (-428,000) on a year ago. Spirits are clearly the third favourite type of alcohol with 6,083,000 Australians (30.4%) now drinking spirits, down 2.8% points (-538,000) on mid-2021. The findings are from the Roy Morgan Single Source survey, Australia’s most trusted and comprehensive consumer survey, derived from in-depth interviews with over 60,000 Australians each year.

CORPORATES
ROY MORGAN LIMITED

Meal delivery services now used by over 7 million Australians after strong growth during the pandemic

Original article by Roy Morgan
Market Research Update – Page: Online : 10-Aug-22

New research from Roy Morgan shows that over 7 million Australians aged 14+ (33.4%) now use a meal delivery service in an average three months, up from 3.6 million (16.9%) in early 2020. Uber Eats is again the clear market leader used by 3.5 million Australians, up from 2.3 million in early 2020. The use of meal delivery services grew rapidly over the last two years of extended lockdowns around much of the country – and especially in the two largest States of New South Wales and Victoria. A look at the different generations shows that Millennials (born 1976-1990) and now aged from 31-46 years old, are the most likely to use a meal delivery service. Now 45.8% of Millennials use a meal delivery service in an average three months, more than doubling their usage since early 2020 (+24% points). Just behind is Generation Z (born 1991-2008), with 43% (up 17% points from early 2020) now using meal delivery services in an average three months. Some 29.6% of people in Generation X now use meal delivery services, more than doubling from 14.4% in early 2020. The use of meal delivery services drops off sharply in the older generations aged over 60. Under one-in-six Baby Boomers (15.9%, up 8.5% points from early 2020) and only 12.3% (up 7.4% points) of Pre-Boomers used one of the services.

CORPORATES
ROY MORGAN LIMITED

Australian streaming apps from TV brands chip away at Netflix dominance

Original article by Josh Taylor
The Guardian Australia – Page: Online : 3-Aug-22

Data from Sensor Tower shows that the Disney+ app was downloaded almost two million times in Australia during the last 12 months. Disney+ retained its status as the top downloaded entertainment app in Australia, ahead of Amazon, TikTok and Netflix. The streaming apps of local companies Nine, the ABC, Seven and Stan were also among the 10 most-downloaded apps during the last year. Sensor Tower’s data is based on the number of new downloads from the Apple and Android stores. Netflix still dominates Australia’s streaming video sector; research by Roy Morgan in February found that Netflix has more than 12 million subscribers nationwide.

CORPORATES
SENSOR TOWER, DISNEY+, AMAZON PRIME VIDEO, TIKTOK, NETFLIX INCORPORATED, NINE ENTERTAINMENT COMPANY HOLDINGS LIMITED – ASX NEC, SEVEN WEST MEDIA LIMITED – ASX SWM, AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION, STAN ENTERTAINMENT PTY LTD, ROY MORGAN LIMITED

Chinese-made clothes, electrical goods, mobile phones, footwear, and sporting goods lose favour among Australians

Original article by Roy Morgan
Market Research Update – Page: Online : 22-Jun-22

New research by Roy Morgan shows that Australians are less likely than pre-pandemic to buy products across a wide range of industries if they know the product is ‘Made in China’. The largest declines were for clothes, electrical goods, mobile phones, footwear and sporting goods, with preference for these products falling between 2%-6% points during the pandemic years of 2020-21. Clothes are still the most ‘popular’ product for Australians that is ‘Made in China’. However, in March 2022 only 25% of Australians said they would be more likely to buy clothes if they knew the clothes were ‘Made in China’, down 4% points from March 2020. The same trend was evident for Chinese-made electrical goods, with 23% (down 5% points from 2020) of Australians saying they’d be more likely to buy the product if they knew it was ‘Made in China’, mobile phones on 21% (down 6%), footwear on 17% (down 5%) and sporting goods on 15% (down 2%). These results are from the Roy Morgan Single Source survey, derived from comprehensive in-depth interviews with over 1,000 Australians each week and around 60,000 Australians per year.

CORPORATES
ROY MORGAN LIMITED

Eyeballs on the march as free-to-air TV slumps

Original article by James Madden, Sophie Elsworth
The Australian – Page: 15 & 23 : 30-May-22

Analysis of ratings data from OzTAM highlights the decline of free-to-air television in Australia. SBS has increased its audience by 15 per cent since 2012, but viewership of the other FTA broadcasters has declined. This decline is particularly acute in the breakfast timeslot; the average weekday metropolitan audience of Seven Network’s ‘Sunrise’ was 260,650 in 2021, compared with 364,445 in 2012, while the average audience of Nine’s ‘Today’ has fallen from 334,954 to just 219,032. The increasingly crowded streaming market has accelerated the decline of FTA in recent years. However, Ben Willee of Spinach Advertising says TV is still a powerful medium for reaching audiences.

CORPORATES
OZTAM PTY LTD, SPECIAL BROADCASTING SERVICE (SBS), SEVEN NETWORK LIMITED, NINE NETWORK AUSTRALIA LIMITED, SPINACH ADVERTISING PTY LTD