The COVID-19 pandemic could be a major inflection point that changes consumer behaviors for years.
Over the past month and a half, streaming to the TV viewing has more than doubled in the U.S. — and with the current stay-at-home lifestyle, more Americans say they expect to keep watching more TV and streaming services after the coronavirus crisis is over, according to a new poll by L.A.-based E-Poll Market Research.
On the flip side, social distancing have people wary about going to movie theaters, concerts, sporting Events and theme parks — with those activities having among the highest net-negative consumer intent on E-Poll’s survey, conducted April 16-20. Only “taking a cruise” registered lower.
The top two activities Americans plan to continue after “things return to normal” are exercising outdoors and in at-home gyms, along with a pronounced lift in cooking, E-Poll’s survey found.
Close behind was “watching TV shows, movies, streamed programming”: 21% of those surveyed said they intend to do more of that, while 14% said they expect to do less (for a net consumer intent of +7%). Streaming music was also cited as an activity U.S. consumers plan to do more, with a net +6%.
The survey findings suggest the high-water mark for TV viewing could be the new baseline. According to Nielsen, streaming video viewing on TVs in the U.S. hit 654.6 billion minutes from March 23-April 19, more than twice the 301.4 billion in the comparable four-week period in 2019. For the week of April 13, Netflix — which added nearly 16 million customers in the first quarter — captured the biggest share of that viewing time (32%) followed by YouTube (20%).
Meanwhile, prior research has confirmed that people will continue to be skittish about attending large gatherings even after lockdowns are lifted. About 47% of those surveyed agreed that the idea of going to a major public event “will scare me for a long time,” per a study last month by Performance Research.
That said, research based on asking people to forecast their own expected behavior isn’t always a great indicator of what will actually happen: People often say one thing but end up doing another. It’s even more dicey given the uncertainty surrounding when quarantines will begin lifting in the U.S.
With that caveat, here’s a look at how Americans currently expect their activities to change, per the E-Poll survey.
Lifestyle Changes Post-Pandemic
When the crisis is over – will you be doing more of, the same amount, or less of the following compared to what you did before the crisis?
| More | Less | Net Difference | |
| Exercising | 27% | 7% | 20% |
| Cooking for yourself/family/friends | 25% | 8% | 17% |
| Using FaceTime, Skype, WhatsApp or other technologies to video call friends/family | 19% | 12% | 7% |
| Watching TV shows, movies, streamed programming | 21% | 14% | 7% |
| Streaming music | 12% | 6% | 6% |
| Listening to the radio/podcasts/smart speakers | 10% | 9% | 2% |
| Grocery shopping online | 15% | 15% | 0% |
| Traveling within the U.S. | 15% | 20% | -5% |
| Traveling outside of the U.S. | 9% | 18% | -9% |
| Ordering delivery or take out | 13% | 22% | -9% |
| Eating out/Going out to restaurants | 19% | 28% | -9% |
| Seeing movies in the theater | 12% | 23% | -11% |
| Going to music concerts/theater | 10% | 22% | -12% |
| Going to sporting events | 8% | 20% | -13% |
| Going to theme parks | 8% | 20% | -13% |
| Taking a cruise | 3% | 22% | -18% |
Source: E-Poll Market Research, April 2020 survey of 1,677 U.S. consumers 13 and older