Consumers’ Habits Indicate Home is Where the Bar is

Furniture World News Desk on 1/24/2018

According to a survey from the wine app Vivino, 47% of Millennials and 61% of Generation X and Baby Boomers say they would rather drink at home than at a social gathering, bar, or winery.

By Lorri Kelley

 As a business executive, meetings, travel, and the day-to-day tasks essential to running a company can make life a little hectic. So when the weekend comes, I usually prefer to unwind from the comfort of my own home. And guess what? A growing number of consumers feel the same way.

For so many these days, spending Saturday and Sunday at home doesn’t just mean a weekend full of chores and lounging around. It means movie nights with the family or having friends and colleagues over for dinner and a few drinks. It means trading cover charges, large crowds, and big bills for a more intimate setting where you get to pick the guests, music, menu, and even the décor.

This trend even has a name. In the home furnishings industry, it’s been coined “home-tainment.” And the statistics indicate that it’s more than just a flash in the pan. According to a survey from the wine app Vivino, 47% of Millennials and 61% of Generation X and Baby Boomers say they would rather drink at home than at a social gathering, bar, or winery.

The numbers also don’t stop at cocktails. If you can’t remember the last time you went to a movie theater, you aren’t alone. Another study shows that ticket sales have steadily dropped 21% since 2002. You can thank streaming technologies and devices for that, along with services like Redbox, which make it easy to access the latest movies and TV series with the touch of button.

With more people entertaining at home, this affords a big opportunity for the home furnishings industry to sell products that make it easier for people to play host from the comfort of their homes. In our own industry, we’ve seen a tremendous surge in demand for home bars, while media furniture continues to be a growth segment for us.

We spend a lot of time developing products that are not only beautifully designed with innovative features, but also have wide consumer appeal. So how can retailers maximize on this growing demand for home-tainment products with their own customers? Here are a few tips.

Know Your Audience
What captures the attention of a Millennial fresh out of college most definitely differs from what captures the attention of a retired Baby Boomer. Sounds simple enough, yet marketing today doesn’t always reflect this. Through your website, content or outreach marketing efforts, consider what drives your target audience to buy, and bring that story to life. For instance, Millennials are all about gathering with friends in casual settings while Baby Boomers are drawn to retirement living or time with their grandchildren. Knowing your audience’s preferences is critical in making sure how you reach out to them will impact them.

Photography that Sells
As a manufacturer, beautiful photography is one of our most important tools we have in sharing the features of our products and the stories behind their design. We also make sure to offer these tools to our retailers, so they can better sell to the end consumer. Check with your own manufacturing partners to see what graphic assets they have available for you. If their photography isn’t in line with your brand, consider generating your own graphics, if there is budget for it, or make use of stock photography to find the imagery that will resonate with your audience.

Display is the Thing
You’ve gotten the customer into you store -- great work! But the sale is far from complete. A critical selling point is staging your products and displays in a way that allows consumers to envision them in their homes. Selling a home bar or bar cart? Make sure your display is fully stocked with a selection of wine and spirits, along with bar accessories to show how a customer can use the bar to entertain guests at home. If media cabinets are on your floor, your display should include the latest OLED or 4K TV and sound technology, such as soundbars, to show how the cabinet can accommodate a great home entertainment system.

In the home furnishings industry, we must always be thinking ahead for the consumer, and helping them solve their design challenges. Yet as we look forward to 2018, we can likely count on “home-tainment” continuing to gain momentum in the coming year.