Overall consumer confidence to spend continues to move sideways, but the homegoods category will be the exception benefiting from improved spending plans from Millennials to Boomers.
That’s the takeaway from the latest spending confidence data through February. The data otherwise support signs that post-holiday spending will return to a less robust pace in other retail categories. See more about recent spending trends here.
Outside of homegoods, Millennials showed a modest uptick in confidence to spend over the next 90 days—although they have struggled to sustain an improving trend in their spending plans in recent months.
Here is more on what the confidence trends suggest by category and generation:
- Homegoods. The pickup in spending plans for homegoods partly reflects a rebound from the prior month in confidence to spend in this category. The pickup was especially evident among two key groups. See the report below for more.
- Electronics. The electronics category also saw improvement in February in confidence to spend. That improvement was strong in one especially important generational group. For more, see the report below.
- Leisure goods. Confidence to spend on these goods—including sporting goods, toys, music, and videos—edged higher in February, but the improvement was particularly strong in one key generational group. See the report below for more.
- Clothing. Clothing halted a two-month slide in confidence to spend. The slight February improvement was focused in two generational groups. See report below for more.
- Food & grocery. Spending confidence in the food and grocery categories held nearly steady in February, but the generational breakouts show an improving trend in one key group. See the report below for more.
- Health & beauty. Confidence to spend on health and beauty in February remained off its year-end highs. The category has held up best among two generations. See the report below for more.
These are among the takeaways from data through February from the Spending Confidence Index™, which is the proprietary index of consumer sentiment created by MacroSavvy™ based on data from Prosper Insights and Analytics™.
For more background about the Spending Confidence Index™ and its components, the white paper at this link explains why the new index is an improvement over existing measures of confidence.
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