The Leisure Tracker focuses on spending patterns across leisure sectors such as eating out, drinking out, gambling, cinema-going, health & fitness and live events, with results based on an online, nationally representative sample of 2,000 adults.
Greene King’s commercial director, Steve Jebson said: “We are delighted to be launching the first ever Greene King Leisure Tracker. We have been running the data since August 2013, so we have already built up a detailed picture of where and when GB households direct their leisure spending.”
Insight
Jebson told the Publican's Morning Advertiser's sister title M&C Report that Greene King had initiated the project – with research partners YouGov and Trajectory – to better understand and get closer to its customers.
“There’s not currently enough insight in the market as to how people spend their leisure time. In any given month, customers have a set amount of money to spend on leisure – not just eating and drinking, but other activities and events.”
He added: “This research provides real information on real customers, and will allow us to demonstrate thought leadership for the wider leisure market.”
Behaviours
Paul Flatters, chief executive of Trajectory, said: “This kind of category leadership shows a true understanding of the importance of consumer behaviour on spending, which not only benefits the leisure trade, but also those involved in reporting it. We are confident the Greene King Leisure Tracker will be used by the trade, by the media and by the City as the place to find a timely and thorough overview of Britain’s leisure behaviours.”
The first Leisure Tracker report highlighted a 6% growth in household leisure spending from £191 in January to £203.40 in February, driven up by the impact of the half-term holiday and the gradual recovery of the consumer finances after the festive period.
It also showed that £11 of the £12 increase in spending came from eating out and drinking out, which cater for two thirds of the measured spend in the survey. Household spending on leisure activities peaked in December at £249.
Half-term contributed to a rise of 30% in leisure spend among households with kids in February (£238.76) versus January (£183.82). In contrast, the average household without kids marginally reduced total leisure spend in February (Jan: £193.49/Feb: £191.01).
Jebson said: “We expect that leisure spend among households with kids will fall back considerably next month as these consumers return to term-time routines.”
Eating-out
The research found that increased eating out activity driven by Valentine’s Day and half-term contributed towards growth in average spend of 11% (£7) in February versus January, with the much of this increase in spend driven by family households outside of London and the South East.
Average eating out spend per household in London and the South East increased by £4 between January and February. Elsewhere across the country, eating out spend rose by £8. The impact of half-term is evident in the data with family eating out spend rising by £18 in February versus January. Households without kids saw only a small increase in spend of £3 during the same period.
Drinking-out
Across the previous three months, households in London and the South East have on average spent 18% more on drinking out than households in the rest of the country. During the same period, households without kids on average spent 20% more on drinking out than family households.
While households in the South East only saw a modest £1 (2%) increase in drinking out spend between January and February, households in the rest of the country increased their drinking out spend by over £5 per household (15%).
Regional variations
In February, the tracker found that average household leisure spend was £37 higher in London and the South East (£228.62) than in the rest of the country (£191.98).
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