ECBER KHONKAEN UNIVERSITY
CONSUMER BEHAVIOR HABITUDES IN YANGON, MYANMAR A Report Based on Primary Data Analysis
JANUARY 2014
Copyright: E-Saan Centre of Business and Economic Research (ECBER), Khon Kaen University (KKU), Thailand
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CONTENTS OVERVIEW………………………………………………………………………………………………05 1) LEARNING HABITUDES…………………………………………………………………………….06 2) WORKING HABITUDES……………………………………………………………………………..07 3) EATING AND DRINKING HABITUDES……………………………………………………………08 4) GROOMING HABITUDES……………………………………………………………………………09 5) FASHION HABITUDES………………………………………………………………………………10 6) HEALTH AND WELLNESS HABITUDES…………………………………………………………..11 7) SMOKING HABITUDES……………………………………………………………………………...12 8) SHOPPING HABITUDES……………………………………………………………………………..13 9) LEISURE HABITUDES………………………………………………………………………..….......15 10) HOME AND DIY GARDEN HABITUDES…………………………………………………………15 11) PET OWNERSHIP HABITUDES……………………………………………………………………18 12) TRAVEL/HOLIDAY HABITUDES……………………………………………………………….18 13) COMMUTING HABITUDES……………..……………………………………………………..…...19 14) FINANCIAL HABITUDES………………………………………………………………………...20
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CONSUMER BEHAVIOR HABITUDES IN YANGON, MYANMAR OVERVIEW Myanmar represents a distinct number of ethnic groups existing side by side for many centuries in Myanmar and they have their own dialects and culture. Most of inhabitants believe in the religion Buddhism and follow Buddha's teachings and represent Buddhist heritage with simple living principle and earn their livelihood from agriculture. Myanmar is an agriculture based nation and the majority of the people reside in large rural areas of the country side. During harvesting time people in Myanmar celebrate festivals and perform the Buddhist rituals and offer merit at temples. They wear Burmese traditional costumes specially ‘longyi’ and reside in timber or bamboo traditional dwellings. Inhabitants in Myanmar like to make pilgrimage to some interesting sites and well known pagodas in Myanmar when they have vacations. Burmese are simple, frank and reliable people. They relish traditional Burmese dances and cultural theatre. In the big cities like Yangon, Mandalay, Nay-pyi-daw (Capital city) people are businessman, private company employees and government workers and some of the city dwellers work in factories. They reside in semi-modern usual timber dwellings. They relish going out with friends and relatives and like to go on trips with family and friends. The young generation wears fashionable dresses and spends cash on leisure apart from their livelihood. Most of the respondents (400) of Yangon, Myanmar where the survey was done are young and 71.6% of the respondents were between the age group of 18-49 Yrs and females outnumbered male respondents. The average income of majority of the respondents is quite low with 52% of the respondents having income less than 166US$, another 24% of the respondents having income between 167-333US$, some 15% of respondents having income between 334-833US$ and only 9% have income over 834US$. The currency of Myanmar (Burma) is Burmese Kyat (MMK) (1/100= Pya) and is weak in the international foreign exchange market (1 US$= 978.0000 MMK). The
reflections of the survey indicate that the Myanmar people embrace for higher learning to better their future prospects. They are hard-working and mostly are educated people in urban areas. In this report we try to analyze the consumer behavior in Yangon, Myanmar covering fourteen habitudes. In this report we try to analyze the consumer behavior trends in Yangon, Myanmar covering fourteen habitudes.
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1) LEARNING HABITUDES Learning habitudes change over the period of time and in Yangon, Myanmar the change is also happening, according to our survey response from 400 respondents around 60% of the respondents have Bachelor’s degree, 18% have a High School education and 8% have Masters Degree and 7% have a Diploma/Vocational certificate and very few go for higher education with only 2% having earned a doctorate degree. The percentage of the respondents taking up vocational training or education is also small which gives us the picture that there is immense shortage of highly skilled/semi-skilled people in Yangon, Myanmar. The overall general education level of respondents can be termed as literate. In Yangon, the education is received mainly through public/government institutes (91% of the respondents) and very few inhabitants go for private or overseas education because it is very expensive. There are a number of schools and universities in Myanmar but they have been opening and closing in the last few decades due to political situations in the countries but after the opening up of the economy recently to the international community the education sector is also witnessing a substantial growth with the growing demand for skilled and qualified people. The religion Buddhism plays a more important role in the Myanmar society and many students had their schooling in Buddhist temples previously but recently many new international schools are coming up in Yangon and other major cities of Myanmar. The upper middle class and expatriates prefer to send their children to international schools with good standard of education. And, some high income citizens of Myanmar also prefer to send their wards for good education overseas to countries like Singapore or Thailand. Household income in Myanmar is relatively low and many students do not get to go to school or university especially from the rural areas. The universities and vocational colleges in Myanmar are now opening on a regular basis to adhere to the growing demand. The Exhibit1 below gives the idea of the education level of the respondents from Yangon, Myanmar.
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Exhibit 1:
Highest Education Level of Respondents of Yangon, Myanmar 2% 1% 8%
4% Primary School 18%
Secondary School High School
7%
Diploma/Vocational Certificate Bachelor's Degree Master's Degree
60%
Doctorate degree
2) WORKING HABITUDES In Yangon, Myanmar, a majority (31%) of the respondents work in private firms and another significant section of them (21%) are owners of small and very small businesses (selling from small shops, kiosks and carts) and yet another small number of respondents (7%) are self employed medium and large scale business owners who are also the privileged class and the remaining section of the inhabitants are government employees, students, temporary workers, housewives and freelancers. Many Myanmar people live away from home for work and therefore move to big cities where they have their livelihood and live in rental or owned apartments/flats. After opening up the market in the recent years many young Burmese got their first jobs in the shopping centers and new businesses. This has increased the workforce significantly though many of these workers are still unskilled and inexperienced which creates a great demand for vocational training in all fields. Some people start working from a very young age by helping their parents in their family business and are able to take the responsibility of the business when they grow young. People in Yangon, Myanmar mostly commute to work in public transport like Page 7 of 21
buses (38% of respondents), some privileged upper income group travel to work in cars (33%), some travel by taxi or cabs (13%) and there are some (8%) who prefer to walk to their work place.
3) EATING AND DRINKING HABITUDES Majority of the Myanmar respondents (98.8%) prefer to cook their own food at home as a part of their tradition or as a way of life because for many its cheaper to have food at home than to buy cooked food or to dine outside. In Yangon, Myanmar, cooking in the households is mainly done by themselves or family members at homes like parents or spouse. It is noted from the survey that 97.3% of Yangon respondents like to cook their local traditional variety of recipes for food at home including sometimes Thai and Chinese food as well and only a very tiny percentage of respondents prefer to cook something different like Western food at home. Many respondents prefer to cook meals at home for Breakfast (73.8% of respondents), Lunch (57.8%) and Dinner (91.3%) and consume less food outside, even the lunch which they have to consume while being outside home, around 27.5% of respondents prefer to bring their food box from home. Supper is not very popular. In Myanmar during breakfast time people prefer to have Tea/Coffee (75% of respondents), Rice with elaborated different dishes (39%), Bread Egg Sandwich Ham/Sausage (22%), Bread/Bun/Baguette (22%), and Milk (21%).
People in Myanmar have a great influence of Buddhism on their eating behavior and many of the respondents are vegetarians and and avoid having meat in some days of the week thinking its like being kind to nature and animals . The respondents in Yangon, Myanmar have fairly healthy drinking habits with a very small number of citizens drinking alcohol regularly and a majority of the respondents not having alcohol at all as is evident from the survey and presumably the reason to consume less alcohol can be because of the influence of their religion Buddhism and some don’t like taste. But there are around 30-35% of the respondents aged between 18 to 49 years old who showed some alcohol consumption trends. Majority of females do not drink alcohol with only 1% of female respondents have alcohol regularly and 6.2% consuming alcohol sometimes. Night clubs are not a way of life in Myanmar with only 5.3% visiting them sometimes and 94.8% have never been to night clubs. Other drinks that the respondents consumed daily are milk Page 8 of 21
(25.5 %), fresh brewed coffee (27.5%), instant coffee (42.8%), tea (28%), and vegetable/fruit juice (13.3%). And some drinks that’s they preferred to drink sometimes (once or twice a week) are soya milk (16.5%), vegetable/fruit juice (24.8%), soft drink with gas (28.5%), soft drink without gas (23.3%) and energy drink (17.8%).
4) GROOMING HABITUDES Myanmar respondents have a simple living and majority of the males do not involve in any grooming and only 25% of the male population uses creams/lotions and another 24% consumes vitamins and supplement for better health and looks. In the female segment there is a lot more to beauty and personal care happening with a significant percentage of female population going for lotions/creams, make-ups, vitamins etc. With the changing times Myanmar population is getting more beauty and personal care conscious and the trend is expanding gradually and a number of beauty clinics are coming up in many big cities like for example the Wuttisak Clinic from Thailand has a branch in Yangon, Myanmar. Many women go to these clinics for skin laser treatment and some to go to get some beauty course done. Picture 1: Advertisement of Wuttisak Clinic in Yangon
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5) FASHION HABITUDES Myanmar's traditional dress, which is still compulsory in schools, universities and most state owned workplaces, is the traditional "longyi" which is a thin sheet of cotton or silk cloth wrapped around the waist down to the feet. But with the opening of the markets in the recent years the younger generation has got thriving for new fashionable trends, especially the urbanized young women who are increasingly avoiding the national dress and embracing more modern alternatives and outfits. The male fashions are evolving as well with a growing taste for the rock music-inspired youth style and also changing grooming habits. Though, owing fashion /luxury items such as clothes, shoes, watches, bags, sunglasses etc. that value more than $1,000 is not very common as only 13.5% of Myanmar respondents owned 1-2 expensive items and the majority of the respondents did not own any luxury items and most of these luxury items are bought from shopping centre/department stores. Some respondents also mentioned that they buy these luxury items form online shopping by going to the Facebook page of the seller and appoint the seller for materializing the deal. The main reason to own fashion/luxury items as cited by the respondents is that they buy these items for mainly good design plus high quality and for social status in society as well. In the Exhibit 2 we can see the ownerships percentage of luxury items. Exhibit 2:
Luxury Items Ownership Among Yangon Respondents that Value Over $1000 2.3% 1.5%
13.5% None Some 1-2 Luxury Items About 3-5 Luxury Items More than 5 Luxury Items
82.8%
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6) HEALTH AND WELLNESS HABITUDE According to the response of the survey many respondents have a low tendency of smoking and drinking which gives a fairly good healthy picture of the society. In case of minor illness the respondents preferred to buy over the counter medicine to fix their sickness and some prefer to see a doctor. But, some sections of the society 12% still prefer to visit a traditional doctor or would like to have herbal medicines to get better. When there is a moderate or serious illness most of the respondents preferred to visit a clinic and some prefer to visit a private hospitals but some higher income privileged class people also prefer to go to hospitals abroad to countries like Thailand or Singapore for Annual Health Checks or Specialized Medical Procedures/Treatments. Medical insurances are still not prevalent in the Myanmar society and will take a while to grow with the growing demand and opening of the markets. Public hospitals are not very much a place to visit for general public because they may be lacking the medical facilities to provide good treatment. Exhibit 3 & 4 give further details. Exhibit 3:
General Habitude to Fix Minor Illness Among Yangon Respondents 2% 3% 3% Do nothing 12% Buy medicine from nearby pharmacy Seeing doctor at clinic 37%
Seeing doctor at hospital 43% Taking herb or seeing traditional doctor Others
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Exhibit 4:
General Preferences for Medical Treatment for Severe Illness Among Yangon Respondents 1.3% 0.3% 2% 3%
Modern international hospital 17.5% Public hospital Private hospital Clinic Seeing traditional doctor 75.9%
Others
7) SMOKING HABITUDES Interestingly among the overall respondents smoking is not very popular with only 20.5% of them smoke and 79.5% of the respondents do not smoke which is a good sign for healthy lifestyle. The male inhabitants smokes more (39% of male respondents) and the females hardly smoke in Myanmar society. Most of the people prefer not to smoke in public places and a majority of them favor to enforce a law to prohibit smoking in public places. And, the people who do smoke buy the cigarettes from grocery shops, traditional retailers and convenient stores. And, many of the low income inhabitants still chew betel nuts because they are cheaper and it’s a traditional way of life for this section of society. The Exhibit 5 on the next page shows the smoking habits by age group.
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Exhibit 5:
Smoking Habits (By Age Group) of Yangon Respondents Yes
No
More than 60 Years
22.8%
77.2%
50-60 Years
21.1%
78.9%
40-49 Years
21.3%
78.8%
30-39 Years 23-29 Years 18-22 Years
14.3% 20.6% 25.4%
85.7% 79.4% 74.6%
8) SHOPPING HABITUDES Myanmar has been for long a closed market and now the thing are changing and shopping is also an activity that people of Yangon, Myanmar like to do, with only 11% of the respondents never or rarely go shopping. In Myanmar today, there are a variety of modern hypermarket stores recently opened in Yangon and exhibit an international standard compared with neighboring countries and promotions and advertisements are also catching up to attract customers. People go to shopping at many places like wet markets, grocery/traditional retailers, convenient store, super/hyper markets and shopping/department stores depending on location and what they want to buy. In Yangon, as per respondents’ response the consumer products like detergents, tissue paper are mainly bought from convenient stores (32.5% of respondents) and super/hyper markets (26.9%) and the frequency of buying is once or twice in a month (63.3% of respondents), products like soap, shampoo, toothpaste are also purchased from convenient stores (34.3%) and super/hyper markets (29.1%) and the frequency of buying is once or twice in a month (67.4% of respondents), skincare products like body/face lotion, deodorants are shopped mainly at super/hyper markets (42.2%) and shopping centre/department store (29.3%) and the frequency of Page 13 of 21
buying is once or twice in a month (43.6% of respondents) and another 32.2% of respondents say they buy every three months, makeup products are also mostly bought from super/hyper markets (39.9%) and shopping centre/department store (34.7%) the frequency of buying is a little varied as some 36.7% of respondents say they buy every three months, some 32.9% of respondents say once or twice in a month and another 26.6.% of respondents they buy makeup products in six months or longer. Other products like books/magazines are mainly bought from specialty stores (26.2%), super market/hyper markets (24.8%) and some (20.4%) buy them form shopping center/department store and the frequency of buying is once or twice very week for 20.4% of respondents, 43.3% respondents say they buy books and magazines once or twice every month. Teenagers in Yangon, Myanmar have exhibited significant changes in their behavior in hanging out with friends and colleagues nowadays, just few years in the past they used to get together at Shwe Dagon (Buddhist Temple) as a meeting place in Yangon but now they prefer meeting at the shopping malls and coffee shops and also find their first time jobs there and form their first time jobbers’ groups.
Picture 2 & 3: Markets in Yangon, Myanmar
2) A Wholesale Market
3) A Traditional Market (Shops)
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9) LEISURE HABITUDES Leisure habitudes of Yangon respondents are mainly watching television with 99.5% of the respondents watch television regularly or sometimes, they have 4 national channels on telecast over the country and Thai and Korean Channels are received through cable network and the Korean programs/series are the most popular, specially Drama! Some inhabitants in Yangon like watching movie and listening to music with only 22% of respondents saying that they have seen movies and listened to music, sports doesn’t seem to be a popular activity in Yangon almost 65% of the respondents have never or rarely played sports but they like watching sports on television. Reading books is also a favorite activity in for Myanmar people as 32.5% of the respondents read regularly and 60.3% sometime which indicates that reading is also popular leisure activity people adhere to in their spare time and with the opening up of the country and more freedom of publishing books and newspapers has given rise to more active readership. Internet and social networking is also a quite widely preferred leisure activity for Myanmar people with 63.4% respondents in Yangon surfing internet either regularly or sometimes. Exercise is also another activity the people like to do in their leisure time with 53.8% of the respondents exercise sometimes and 21.5% regularly. People in Yangon also like to cook at home and doing housework like cleaning during their leisure time at home but have less interest in doing handicraft or art activities. Gardening also is also an activity people indulge in with 38.1% of the respondents do garden activities sometimes. Partying out is prevalent among 37% of the respondents but mostly sometimes. Though, drinking and partying percentage is substantially low but people like to have beer and BBQ get together.
10) HOME AND DIY GARDEN HABITUDES The meaning of home for many Myanmar people is the same like most people around the world. In Yangon, Myanmar only 29.8% of the respondents said they lived seven days in a week at home, 40% said that they lived only one day in a week at home, which give a fair idea that people move out from home for work and education. Most of the homes in Myanmar are self build (46%), but some buy from developers (21%). Myanmar people like to have 1-3 bedrooms in the house, they like to have 1-2 bathrooms in their house and the majority of the consumers have traditional type kitchens. Myanmar people prefer tradition living style over western style of living. The kitchenware widely used in Myanmar are gas/electric stoves (93% of the Page 15 of 21
respondents), refridgerator (84%), and electric kettle (72%) and the other kitchenwares are toastesr, microwaves, stainers, ovens, cooker hoods etc.
Irrespective of income ranges most of
the respondents said they would prefer to buy unfurnished house than buying fully furnished house. In Myanmar, the most prevalent building material used for construction seems to be Brick and Cement (67%), Semi-wooden Semi cement (20%), and complete wood as material is used in traditional houses but are difficult to find nowadays because of expensive price of wood. People in Myanmar like privacy and majority of the houses like to have curtains in their house. Flats and apartments are the main residential type accommodation preferred by people in Yangon, Myanmar. Picture: 4 & 5: Apartments/Flats and Furniture Factory in Yangon, Myanmar
4) Apartments Building
5) Wooden Furniture Factory
Regarding DIY and Gardening habits, 83% of the respondents did not have a garden in their present house because many of the respondents live in apartments/flats. Only 16% of the people seem to do regular gardening at home and 45% doing some gardening activities at home. And that they rarely do any craftwork or handcraft works. Most respondents can do some home maintenance by themselves such as replacing the light bulb, plumbing, fixing chair and do home maintenance regularly.
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In Myanmar, according to respondents’ response it seems that people do not prefer hiring any architect, interior designers, or designers to decorate their houses, 84% of the respondents said that they did not hire any designer at all to decorate/design their homes. Therefore, hiring designers is not popular in Myanmar in all income groups.
Exhibit 6 & 7 gives more dtails of
Home Gradening and Maintenance preferences. Exhibit 6:
Percentage (%) of Yangon Respondents' Preference of Doing Gardening
16%
39%
Regularly Some Never / Rarely 45%
Exhibit 7:.
Percentage (%) of Yangon Respondents ' Preference of Doing Home Maintenances
30%
11% Regularly Some Never / Rarely
59%
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11) PET OWNERSHIP HABITUDES Regarding having pets at home, the most popular pet among the inhabitants of Yangon, Myanmar are cats as 22.5% of the respondents own cats, and some people own dogs and other pets are fairly less popular. Pet shop, pet grooming services are not popular as the majority of the people 82.4% have never been to these shops and veterinary services are rarely available for the pets in general. The Exhibit 8 shows the details of pet ownership. Exhibit 8:
Pet Ownership Percentage (%) Among Yangon Respondents Other Fish
1.6% 9.6% 22.8%
Cat Dog
14.6%
12) TRAVEL/HOLIDAY HABITUDES Myanmar respondents like to travel and hang out during weekends and holidays instead of staying at home. Most of respondents in Yangon (66.7%) like to visit villages and farms during holidays to get them close to nature and some (20%) prefer to travel for medical and wellness purposes during holidays. Majority (55%) of respondents travel domestically quite often and the frequency could be monthly or for some (22%) once every few months and in most of the trips they prefer to stay for 5-7days and mostly travel by rental cars or by bus. Traveling overseas is not very frequent with only 12.6% of the respondents travelling once in very six months and many of them may not travel overseas in years. The most popular destinations for traveling overseas are the South-East Asian nations and some prefer to travel to China, Japan, South Korea, Singapore and Hong Kong and very few travel far to Europe and America and this could Page 18 of 21
because of expansive air travel. When travelling overseas some 39% of the respondents prefer to travel with parents/family/relatives and some to travel with friends and some travel alone. The durations for short overseas holidays for some 35% of respondents could be 5-7days and for some 32.6% of the respondents the stay could be even more than 10days for medical, study or work related purposes. The mode of travel in most cases is the regular airlines and only the middle-upper class people can afford an overseas trip. 13) COMMUTING HABITUDES Majority of the Myanmar respondents (38%) prefer to travel/commute to work by public transport that is bus, some privileged section of the society prefer to travel by car and some people walk to work. After the country opening up in the recent years, the mid-high income people started to buy second-hand cars from Japan and as a result the number of vehicles in Yangon, Myanmar is rapidly increasing contributing to frequent traffic jams in the city. People also prefer to live close to shopping areas so that they can walk to buy their daily grocery. The public transport is not very convenient and reliable and private car expensive to own and maintain so many people prefer to walk instead. People in Myanmar like to travel to the Buddhist Pagodas during their free time or weekends and some also like to travel to the rural areas in the country. They prefer to hang out with friend during short holidays instead of staying at home. All these land transportation modes are most widely used by the people of Myanmar to go around locally and domestically. Refer Exhibit 9. Exhibit 9:
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How do people commute to work in Yangon? Walk 6% 3%
11%
Private car
7% 2%
Motocycle Bike 26%
38%
2% 5%
Bus/Public transportation Train, Metro Taxi, Cab Vehicle Provided by my Employer
14) FINANCIAL HABITUDES Financial habitudes for Yangon respondents are very basic and the financial sector is gradually opening up with a growing international interest in Myanmar. Majority of Burmese respondents (96.6%) prefer of use cash in their day to day transactions, debit cards and credit cards are not prevalent in the country and people like to keep money at home than deposit in banks. And regarding investments in stock market 98% say no to these type of stock and shares investment as the overall market in Myanmar is still in the primitive stage and will take years to mature and build investor confidence. Exhibit 10 shows the preferred mode of payments. Exhibit 10:
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Shopping Payment Options used by Yangon Respondents 1% 2.1% 0.3%
Cash Cashier check Debit card Credit card
96.6%
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