Businesses Help Consumers Who Are Spoiled for Choice

Consumers are increasingly so spoiled for choice that it paralyzes them and they end up buying nothing, which is where new "curated" or personally tailored shopping services and goods collections come in.

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Assisted choice of this kind ranges from evening meals to baby products and everything in between.

◆ Proxy Shopping

One company that helps the harried First-Worlder what to have for dinner is "Magic Table". The firm delivers two servings of four types of ingredients for dinner on the day the customer wants along with step-by-step instructions.

Yet 80 percent of Magic Table's customers are double-income couples in their 30s and 40s, neither of whom evidently has the willpower left to decide what to eat after a hard day's work.

Ahn Joo-yeon of Magic Table said the main advantage is that their service is cheaper than paying W6,000 per person to eat out. Around 1,500 households currently use the service.

 

Another service is to get professionals to do the shopping. "Ten Box" delivers products for expecting mothers. In the early stages of pregnancy, they could be books on childbirth, or an album to store the ultrasound photos, moving on in the fourth and fifth months of pregnancy to prenatal care products, make-up and snacks.

Customers can receive a package of periodical items regularly over a 10-month period. Jung Hee-sun (28), a customer, said, "I did not have any time to shop around for prenatal care products because I have to work, but this service sends me the products I need and I just pay using my smartphone".

"Your Stylist", which opened in October, is a tailored clothing service. Customers sign up on the company's website and input their height, weight and clothing size, and a stylist buys matching shoes, clothes and accessories and delivers them to their doorstep.

The company has 3,500 subscribers so far and generates W200 million in revenues a month (US$1=W1,171). A majority of customers are single men and women between 27 and 35.

◆ Growth Potential

According to industry sources, the market for curated shopping is scaled at around W60 billion and expected to grow further.

A study by the Korea Consumer Agency in April last year showed more than 50 companies in Korea offering tailored shopping services.

The KCA surveyed 700 customers who have used tailored purchasing services, and 65.7 percent said they intended to continue using them.

"There is a huge range of products available these days and customers are flooded with choices and information that can be overwhelming. This industry growing further by offering to lighten the burden", Prof. Kwak Keum-joo at Seoul National University said.