.IE Tipping Point Report 2021

When do you think you will feel comfortable shopping in physical stores on your local high street? Base: 1,000, all consumers 6% 28% 27% 23% 16% When the government declares that social distancing and masking are no longer necessary I already feel comfortable shopping in physical stores on my local high street When cases of Covid are much lower than they are now I will not feel comfortable shopping in physical stores ever again When vaccination is available to the general population, not just at-risk groups Section 1 The vaccine era, but no return to normal While Irish consumers are fairly evenly divided on the country’s prospects of a return to normal in 2021, most still don’t feel comfortable shopping in-store on their local high street. The pandemic remains an ongoing crisis. While vaccines have laid down a path back to normality, all government and medical advice suggests that economic restrictions and social distancing requirements are likely to remain in place until at least the end of 2021. Consumers seem to be mostly on the same page. 37% believe that life in 2021 will be more or less the same as it was in 2020, while 18% believe that life will be even more restricted despite the vaccine rollout. Only 10% believe that all pandemic restrictions will be lifted by the end of the year. Just over a third (35%) believe that we will approach pre-Covid normality in 2021, but some restrictions will still be in place at the end of the year. Our research data provides a rough timeline of when consumers expect to feel comfortable shopping in-store. At present, fewer than a quarter of consumers (23%) are entirely at ease shopping in-store on their local high street. With the majority of consumers having reservations about shopping in-store, an online channel is crucial for SMEs in order to survive the restrictions imposed by the pandemic. For businesses and government decision-makers, it is clear that many of the new or accelerated trends in consumer behaviours seen in 2020 will continue this year. Many, in fact, may now be permanent. 45% believe that life will return either mostly or completely to pre-Covid normality by the end of 2021 55% believe that life in 2021 will be mostly the same as life in 2020 or even more restricted Base: 1,000, all consumers .IE Tipping Point 2021: Irish e-commerce and digital business in the Covid vaccine era | 3