According to the Cetelem Observatory, if the French consume more and more low-cost, they are in Europe the most critical towards the brands which practice this strategy and whose rise is mainly linked according to them to the difficulties of purchasing power.
The French have an ambiguous relationship with low-cost. If, on the one hand, consumers favor low-cost food brands like Lidl or Aldi, fly more and more on Easyjet or Ryanair, dress at Primark, shop at Action or equip themselves at Brico Dépôt, they don’t seem to do it happily.
This is what emerges from the study “To each his own low-cost” carried out in 15 European countries by the Cetelem Observatory. The French are thus in Europe those who have the worst image of low-cost. They give these brands and services an average score of 5.9/10, which is the lowest of the panel (following the Austrians). In comparison, the Germans rate it 6.2/10, the British 6.5, the Spaniards and Portuguese 6.8, the Italians and Swedes 6.9. The European average is 6.5.
It is the values associated with low-cost that consumers seem to reject the most, such as remuneration, employment issues or the environmental issue.
“This impression of a “mixed” feeling, between two waters, meets a certain echo when we go into the detail of the values associated with low-cost, indicates the study. 58% of consumers believe that low-cost companies respect human rights, 42% think this is not the case. 55% think they are in line with their ethics, 45% think the opposite.”
Crisis consumption
Questions regarding the perceived quality of low-cost products and services also receive lower responses in France. 48% of consumers believe that we pay less but poor quality products when the European average is only 43%.
Result, the French are less likely than elsewhere to favor low-cost products, with only 41% of them when the European average is 54%. And surprisingly, this frequency of purchase is hardly more marked among low incomes (42% often consume low-cost) than high incomes (40%).
There are also only 37% to wish to consume more low-cost in the future when the European average is at 43%.
For a large proportion of French people, low-cost consumption is therefore crisis consumption associated with purchasing power difficulties but remains unrewarding. Evidenced by the communication of brands in the sector that do not highlight the low-cost. The Lidl and Aldi brands, for example, have refused to be associated with “hard discount” for regarding ten years. The first prefers to communicate on quality with its slogan “The true price of good things” while the second plays the card of modernity with its “Place for the new consumer”.
Ditto in the automobile where the Dacia brand is more desirable with, for example, its Bigster concept and a strategy that targets the C segment, that of the largest SUVs.
“The low-cost market is suffering [en France] of a contrasting image (low price and low quality offer) limiting its attractiveness to consumers, summarizes the study. If this offer constitutes a judicious alternative for consumers, they derive a measured satisfaction from it and anticipate less than the average to intensify this type of consumption in the future.
Despite everything, they consider that the market will continue to develop under the combined effect of budgetary tensions and a growing demand to pay only the right price. 54% of French people believe that low-cost will continue to grow because more and more consumers will have financial difficulties, ie 3 points more than the European average.
