Consumer Preferences - November 2009

By Darius Helm

While salespeople may be well educated in how to sell, how to sell flooring, and how to sell to the female consumer, the economic environment has affected how consumers approach the task of buying flooring. They’re shopping longer, researching more, and negotiating harder, and their tastes are also changing. Retailers who track these changes have a leg up on the competition.

At a CCA Global Partners convention in Florida earlier this year, the group discussed a survey of homeowners, 60% female, who had purchased flooring in the last six months, and the results confirmed that consumers are shopping longer before making a purchase. According to the survey, the process generally takes 14 weeks and is broken into five stages: imagination, product research, seeking advice, considering cost, and purchasing or delegating the purchase. The final two weeks are the most important to the retailer.

A recent survey commissioned by Shaw Industries takes a close look at the buying habits of homeowners actively engaged in the flooring process. CMI, an Atlanta based market research firm, conducted 800 Internet interviews from a national pool. Respondents were predominantly female to match the demographic of flooring buyers. All respondents were between the ages of 25 and 54, they owned their own homes, were the primary or joint shopper for the household’s flooring, and had actively shopped for or purchased flooring in the last 12 months or planned to do so in the next 12 months.

For complete results on Consumer Preferences, see the November 2009 issue of Floor Focus Magazine.

Print the Article