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After reading this page you should turn to your notes and:
- Write out, in your own words, a definition of consumer market, without looking at the computer screen
- Make a note of at least two more examples of a consumer market
- Think of at least one other problem that a business operating in a consumer market might face
Definition:
Consumer markets deal with the final customer. Each customer buys the product for their direct satisfaction and has no other intended use for it.
Examples:
- The market for magazines is a consumer market –the customer doesn’t re-sell the magazine and buys it for their own enjoyment
- The market for CD players is a consumer market – again, the customer doesn’t buy the CD player to re-sell it at a profit or use it to provide the music in a club they own!
Relevance to Business:
Consumer markets can be very profitable markets to operate in: if you are selling a consumer product that is very fashionable then demand could be very high and seemingly never ending! However, fashions change and consumer markets can “bite back”! Unless you try to predict what the latest fashion will be, your time in business could be a short one. Alternatively, you could focus on traditional consumer products that hardly ever go out of fashion e.g. food items. The problem here is that competition could be very strong.
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