Unlocking the Customer Value Chain: How Decoupling Drives Consumer Disruption

by Thales S. Teixeira

The typical household purchases thousands of goods and services throughout the year in hundreds of categories, but the overwhelming majority of that spending—94 percent in 2016 in the United States11—occurred in just seven categories, what I call the Big Seven. The Big Seven categories correspond to a series of consumption choices that people must make in the course of their daily lives: where to live (housing, home goods, and maintenance), how to move (air and land transportation), what to eat (food, drinks, and their preparation), what to wear (fashion, cosmetics, and personal grooming), how to learn (formal and informal education), how to entertain (media, electronics, and sports), and how to heal ourselves (healthcare, physical and mental treatments). If you want to understand potential shifts in your industry, you should look to these categories for early signs. That’s because the Big Seven allow you to identify the major changes in needs, wants, preferences, and behaviors incubating in households that may extend into other categories and industries, including your own.