Shopper Digest: Driving Occasions Beyond Festivities

Core inflation has stabilised (1.8% as of Jan 2025, source: DOSM), with food continuing to be the main driver (2.5% for at-home and 5.0% for out-of-home consumption). Winning a place in shoppers’ baskets remains challenging, as brands must now compete for the residual budget following higher-than-usual spending on essential items.

As a result, communication needs to be carefully crafted around each unique occasion to inspire consumption and reinforce category relevance.

To illustrate this, we will take an impulse category as a case study.

Festivities Are Still Crucial for Gathering Occasions

Although limited in number throughout the year, festive periods represent key gathering occasions. Winning shopper attention during these rare trips is essential to success.

Part of what makes these moments so valuable is that shoppers are typically more willing to spend—likely due to social gatherings driving greater purchase volume. As such, festive periods can deliver comparable total spend to non-festive periods, despite their shorter duration.

The Growing Importance of Winning Outside Festivities

Most of the year comprises non-festive periods, which offer untapped opportunities for category growth. These non-festive moments are now driving faster value growth, suggesting that shoppers are increasingly engaging with the category beyond traditional festive triggers.

While spend per trip may be lower than during festive times, the increased trip frequency signals more potential touchpoints. This opens the door for brands to build consumption occasions throughout the year.

Understanding the different dynamics between festive and non-festive periods is vital when navigating today’s economic landscape. It enables businesses to better prioritise marketing investments and strategically target the right shopper groups.

Despite the stabilisation of core inflation, essential item prices remain elevated. Categories deemed non-essential are still at risk of being deprioritised. It is therefore crucial to create varied consumption occasions to maintain relevance within shoppers’ baskets.

During festive periods, themes such as gathering and celebration drive success—categories that align with these moments are more likely to thrive. Given their rarity, shoppers are naturally more open to spending.

However, brands can adopt the spirit of festivities and replicate it in non-festive periods. Creating unique occasions—such as celebrating personal achievements, spending quality time with loved ones, or rewarding oneself—can significantly reinforce category relevance throughout the year.

At Worldpanel, we track shopper metrics—such as penetration, shopping frequency, basket sizes, volume and value sales—on a consistent 4-weekly basis. This allows you to understand category and brand performance trends over time.

Source: P13 2024 database, Worldpanel Malaysia