Previous issues of the Textile Consumer have focused attention on the importance of understanding the idiosyncrasies of specific generations of consumers, such as Generation Y, Generation X, and the Baby Boomers. Yet consumer research also reveals that attitudes and behaviors change as people age or move into different life stages. Cotton Incorporated's Lifestyle Monitor^TM, now in its ninth year of tracking consumers'  attitudes and behavior, offers an opportunity to compare consumers' responses past and present, to learn whether consumers are changing how they shop for apparel as they mature and age. In this issue, we compare survey responses from 1994 with those from 2002 on several consumer issues. Comparing these survey results over time helps to answer a critical question about today's textile consumers: are they approaching clothes shopping in the same way they did eight years ago?

Consumers Enjoy Clothes Shopping Less

According to the Lifestyle Monitor, infatuation with clothes shopping is a life-stage trait that consumers tend to grow out of—not into. Overall, consumer attitudes toward apparel shopping have changed slightly, with 46% liking or loving to shop in 2002, compared with 47% in 1994. However, the changes within age categories (cohorts) over the eight-year period have been less subtle.

In 1994, 60% of consumers aged 16 to 19 said they with loved or enjoyed Infatuation a life- is shopping for shopping clothes, but by consumers that out of 2002, only 47% of grow this cohort of consumers, now aged 24 to 27, said they loved or enjoyed apparel shopping. This downward trend was seen in six of the seven age groups profiled. As consumers age, their enjoyment of apparel shopping clearly declines.

One key measure of how much consumers like apparel shopping is the time they spend in stores. Consumers today are spending less time shopping for clothes than they did in 1994. Eight years ago, they shopped an average of 1.9 times per month, compared with 1.4 times today, for a loss of six shopping trips annually. In the all-important youth market, the decline was more dramatic. The largest fall-off in shopping time was for consumers aged 16 to 19 in 1994 and 24 to 27 today. Among these consumers, shopping trips declined by 0.7 times per month, for a loss of about eight trips per year.

As enjoyment and time spent shopping for apparel have declined within trait consumer cohorts, so has the percentage of consumers who prefer tend to shop for clothing. When consumers were asked to choose among shopping for apparel, furniture, shoes, electronics, or jewelry, their preference for apparel shopping showed the largest decline with age. The magnitude of this decline among consumers aged 16 to 36 in 1994 and 24 to 44 in 2002 is staggering. But of more concern is the fact that declines were not evident in non-apparel shopping preferences.

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Consumers aged 16 to 19 today exhibit the same enthusiasm for clothes shopping as did their counterparts in 1994—suggesting that a preference for apparel shopping peaks early and declines as consumers grow older. Interestingly, this decline occurs against a pattern of increasing disposable income. In general, as consumers gain in spending power over their lifetimes, they move away from clothes shopping as a spending option.