Source page: McKinsey & Company
Commentary
Still spending after all these fears
Consumer | Inflation
September 26, 2022 – Although consumer spending in the United States has slowed in certain categories (home and electronics, for example) some segments are experiencing double-digit growth. According to our latest Consumer Pulse research, real credit and debit sales of cosmetics have gone up 16 percent, pet supplies sales have grown 11 percent, and grocery stores have seen 12 percent growth. Click through the interactive to see more categories.
To read the article, see “The Great Uncertainty: US consumer confidence and behavior during inflationary times,” August 16, 2022.
Interactive
customizer here
Visual form
Category time-series line and area sequence.
Layout / body structure
Each slide shows one spending category inside a time-series plot. The black line tracks overall spending, while colored area fills show where the selected category is above or below its comparison baseline.
What is being compared
It compares year-over-year change in credit-card and debit-card spending for a selected category against overall spending across all categories.
Measurement system
The measure is percent year-over-year change. Blue shading marks positive change in the selected category, gray shading marks negative change, and the black line gives the overall all-category spending reference.
Visible structure inside the graphic
The visible Grocery stores slide runs from February 2020 through summer 2022, with a large early positive spike, a later gray negative dip, and the black overall line moving through the same period.
Main takeaway from the visual
The sequence shows that real spending was slowing overall, but individual categories and channels still had distinct growth and contraction patterns.
Key standout values or extremes
The visible grocery-store view shows the largest positive surge at the beginning of the pandemic period, while the later series sits much closer to zero with smaller positive and negative deviations.
Controls / sequence, when applicable
Prev and Next step through the eight-slide sequence.
Companion media, when applicable
The chart is the full visual on this page. There is no separate companion audio or video outside the visual.