69% of Generation Z will give up shopping, and retailers will lose £6.5 billion every year!

Data released by Barclaycard Payment shows that among consumers aged 18 to 24 , or Generation Z , 69% will abandon shopping baskets worth up to £6.5 billion.

The research showed that Generation Z was throwing away an average shopping basket worth £156.40 per month, which means retailers were losing £6.5 billion a year. According to Barclaycard, these figures are almost double the amount of shopping baskets thrown away by the over-65s.

The main reason 18-24 year olds give up online shopping is “online window shopping”, where they browse online marketplaces like they would the high street. Lengthy checkout processes (29%) and the intention to return at a later date (26%) are also the main reasons for Gen Z to abandon shopping .

Among them, fashion items are the most likely to be abandoned by Generation Z, and most of them will be left in the shopping basket . 40% of the samples said that they tend to keep these items in the shopping basket. Technology products (25%) and food and beverages (23%) are also two other categories that are usually placed at the back. Moreover, among respondents over 65 years old, fashion items are also the most abandoned items , accounting for 18% of the total.

High delivery costs (39%), the intention to return the item later (36%) and a lengthy checkout process (19%) are the most common reasons for people aged 65 and over to abandon their shopping baskets.

According to Barclaycard, which processes nearly half of all credit and debit card transactions in the U.S. , online transactions continue to grow, up 45.9% year-over-year.

However, new industry regulations, such as Strong Customer Authentication (SCA), require merchants to add more steps to protect consumers from fraud, but this increases the time of the checkout process and hurts sales.

Marc Pettican, president of payments at Barclays, said: “It is vital that online retailers understand and cater to the preferences of all customers, but the unpredictable behaviour of younger customers is most likely to have the biggest impact on the bottom line.

“Our research shows that Gen Z as a group tends to be less patient, less loyal and more likely to quit when shopping than their older peers .”

“More broadly, as online shopping continues to grow and the deadline for full SCA compliance approaches, retailers need to remove as much friction as possible from the checkout process.”

Generation Z

Retailers

Online Shopping