12 A- Figuring Out Buyer Behavior

Segment:  Females, age range roughly 17-30, have some sort of interest in fitness
Product: women's fitness apparel store

Person 1: This person recognizes this need when buying fitness clothing, however there were multiple scenarios when this happened. First, is simply when needing new fitness apparel, whether that be clothing, or shoes, or even a new gym bag. This involves noticing she either didn't have something, or what she does have has not gotten too old. Her response to this is usually to go into stores and shop, and this is when she recognizes the need. She often found that going into stores there weren't a large variety of options, so she would result to shopping online. Another time she recognized this need was when these online apparel brands had sales. A lot of the brands she likes are very expensive, and even on sale they are still a little higher price, because of this she finds it a little stressful trying to decide what size to buy, since in the case of a sale you cannot return or exchange the items if they don't fit right. This was another case of noticing the need for her. Typically her response was for the first instance, to just go to a larger reseller online, for example like champs or footlocker (that way she was not limited to just one brand). For the second scenario, she found that she would do one of two things. The first, look at review videos of the brands by people on YouTube to help determine her size, but if she was still in between two sizes she typically would just not order the items.

Person 2: For this person, one situation in particular really stuck out for identifying the need, the launch days. A lot of her favorite brands launch new clothing every few months. She watches multiple different sizing and review videos for the items releasing, and even has a lot of previous purchases with the brand. Yet, she still feels like every launch she gets an item of clothing that doesn't fit right and has to exchange it. She doesn't really know what she does to solve this need other than just deal with it, despite how frustrating it is. If she had a friend who had the product before the launch she would like to try on the items before the launch, however none of her friends are able to purchase the items prior to the launch.

Person 3: This person found awareness of the need in similar ways to person 1. The first and most obvious was when going into stores searching specifically for fitness apparel. When she struggled to find items in store, she would often just go to brand websites like Nike and Adidas and just order things. The second time she became aware of the need was simply anytime she ordered things online, but especially with the online based brands. She felt as though because places like Nike and Adidas have pretty basic and simple designs, guessing her correct size online wasn't really an issue. However, with the brands the had more fun and unique designs, she found that a lot of times she required different pieces in different sizes, and that was much harder to determine online. When struggling with this, she too would look at sizing/review videos, and try and determine her size by comparing the videos and other items she has.

Doing these interviews I learned that people are genuinely always aware that this need exists, however it becomes most prevalent when actually searching for, or buying, athletic apparel. When searching for information to solve this need, people often had to rely on information put out by the brands (the brands sizing videos, or typically reviews done by brand affiliates). Especially in cases of a new product, there was pretty much no way for them to personally see the product themselves, whether it be in a store to try on or refer to a friends product. Typically, this need is seen in events of actually shopping, applying to women who are mid to younger adults, and specifically looking for fitness apparel. This need isn't really made aware for people who are not in the market of fitness apparel.