KEY OBSERVATIONS from WEEK 11

• EMOTIONS ARE STABILISING, after the initial shock of the Covid-19 restrictions Australians had a negative shift in their emotions. Whilst the positive emotions of Love, Happiness, Contentment and Pride have made progress back toward pre-Covid levels, and our negative emotions are dragging the chain as their inch back to the pre-Covid levels, what we have seen in the past 3 weeks is that all of our emotions have stabilised. And that stabilisation has occurred slightly on below the pre-Covid levels. We watch with interest to see if these emotions levels represent the new normal.
• PINK RECESSION, last week in the press we started to see talk of there being a Pink Recession. In other words, in sectors which employ mostly women there is currently a greater negative impact economically of the crisis. From Forethought’s perspective, when we split the Normality Index by gender, we note that women feel less positive than males with a Normality score of 60% versus men’s 67%. This is also reflected through each of the drivers of Normality. Brands seeking to serve women, might need to be mindful of tone in messaging targeting this segment.
• THE SILVER LINING COHORT is emerging. This group of Australians (14%) believe that life is better than the old normal. This group are showing signs that they are more willing to resume their old behaviours and lifestyle more readily than the rest of the population. They are more prepared to visit restaurants, shop for clothes and even plan a holiday. They can be found across gender, age and work status dimensions – for those charged with driving revenue, the positive is this group is out there and are the green shoots of the return of consumption behaviour. The task is to craft messaging that communicates a contemporary language of Value, and acknowledges the emotions shift in their consumption behaviour. This is the most important of the communications challenge – who do you want to speak to, and what can you say that will motivate their behaviour.
  
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