MILLENNIAL KEY LEARNINGS — THE MAVERICKS — November 25th 2019

Los Angeles Tourism opens first office in India to woo luxury millennial travellers

• Leveraging the burgeoning Indian millennial segment that is increasingly looking at offbeat travelling destinations, Los Angeles Tourism & Convention Board opened its first tourism office in India, located in Mumbai.
• The office will focus on driving travel aspiration and motivate Indian visitors to increase length of stay and spend in Los Angeles.
• The office will work with the travel trade to develop customised and tailored product itineraries in line with consumer and travel trade interests.
• Encouraged by growth indicators in India — especially the growing outbound travel segment — Los Angeles Tourism’s latest visitation forecast projects a year-over-year growth of 4.4% in 2019 with 1,35,000 Indian visitors.
• Indian visitation to Los Angeles is expected to grow by a year-over-year average of 5% over the next five years with nearly 1,65,000 Indian travelers estimated to visit by 2023.

Source: Mint

Indian millennial parents show growing trust in artificial intelligence, robotics for health care: IEEE study

• IEEE unveiled “Generation AI 2019: Third Annual Study of Millennial Parents and Generation Alpha Kids.” The survey reveals the confidence Millennial parents in the US, UK, India, China and Brazil with Generation Alpha children (nine years-old or younger) may have in using artificial intelligence and emerging technologies for the health and wellness of their children.
• 83% of Millennial parents in India would be very comfortable leaving their child at the hospital in the care of an artificial intelligence powered virtual nurse, says the IEEE study
• Millennial parents in Asia are significantly more likely to allow robots powered by AI to conduct surgery on their Generation Alpha child — even more so in 2019 as compared to 2018 (China: 94% in 2019 vs. 82% in 2018; India: 86% in 2019 vs. 78% in 2018), while in 2019, 51% in the UK (a six percent increase over 2018) and 46 percent of Millennial parents in the US (a 1% increase from 2018), say they would be very likely.
• Millennial parents from Asia (India: 90%; China: 89%) say they would be very comfortable using this technology for diagnosing their child.

Source: Data Quest

In keeping with its pioneering spirit in the Holiday Industry, Sterling Holidays Introduces ‘Sterling D&E Impressions’ to enable guests to Holiday Differently!

• The Indian consumer, especially the Millennial are increasingly looking for experiential travel, with immersive and authentic experiences at a particular destination during his holiday, rather than opting for a conventional stay at a hotel.
• In line with this rapidly growing trend, over the last 2 years, Sterling has been delivering Sterling Discoveries & Experiences (Sterling D&E) a customer obsessed approach to provide the customer with memorable and unique experiences on each holiday, both within the resort and in the destination.
• These Discoveries & Experiences highlight the local arts, culture, heritage, cuisine, flora and fauna, making every holiday memorable.

Source: Hospibuz

More than half of Indian consumers do cross-border online shopping: PayPal study

• Indians have taken to cross border shopping like a duck to water, with more than half of online Indian shoppers now purchasing on international sites, a new mCommerce report commissioned by PayPal, a global leader in digital payments, revealed. Also, one in two mobile shoppers in India shop cross-border.
• As much as 54 percent of online shoppers participating in the study shop cross-border, said the study conducted by ipsos.
• Interestingly, the global report suggested that India is leading the mobile commerce usage with 88 percent of them using mobile devices to pay online and 81 per cent of Indian merchants have optimised for mobile shopping.
• Anupam Pahuja, Managing Director, PayPal India, said: “India has been rapidly moving towards digitization and millennials are embracing innovative ways of transacting using technology. We at PayPal, are focused on enabling seamless and safer transactions to become a part of the daily lives of Indian consumers. Mobile penetration gives an impetus to the adoption of digital payments across the country.”
• All age groups rely on their smartphones with a high level of browsing among mobile shoppers. According to the report, 47 per cent millennial mobile shoppers have made spontaneous purchases on their mobiles

Source: HIndu Business Line

How India’s millennials spend

• In India, millennials remain the key drivers of consumer markets. The survey conducted between mid-September and mid-October shows that millennials are much more likely to purchase high-value assets such as apartments or cars compared to either pre-millennials or post-millennials in the coming year. When it comes to two-wheelers, post-millennials edge out millennials.
• Millennials are also more likely to purchase consumer durables such as TV sets or refrigerators compared to other cohorts. Post-millennials are typically poorer than millennials, and some of them are still students. Hence, the disparity between millennials and post-millennials. Among millennials, it is the richer lot who are more likely to make high-value purchases or buy consumer durables.
• The survey results suggest that millennials are not very big spenders when it comes to spending on travel and vacations. When it comes to vacation spending, post-millennials outspend millennials. In fact, millennials seem to be spending less on vacations compared to even pre-millennials, the oldest cohort which includes all respondents above the age of 38.

Source: Mint