Consumer goods industry trends 2027+

Summary: After two postponements, Regulation (EU) 2023/1115 applies to medium and large operators from 30 December 2026 and to micro and small firms from 30 June 2027. The Commission chose targeted scope changes over reopening the text, so cocoa, coffee, palm, soy, rubber, cattle and wood supply chains need geolocation-backed due diligence statements within weeks of the 2027 radar edition.

Current situation: The European Parliament approved the one-year postponement on 26 November 2025 and the Council endorsed it in December 2025 through Regulation (EU) 2025/2650. On 4 May 2026 the Commission published its simplification review with a draft Delegated Act that removes certain cattle hides and leather, retreaded tyres and second-hand goods from scope and adds soluble coffee, palm oil derivatives such as palm-oil soap and frozen cattle tongues. The Parliament had rejected the country benchmarking system on 9 July 2025, yet the review added no no-risk country category. First downstream operators may now rely on upstream reference numbers, the information system relaunched in June 2026, and repositories of national legislation and certification schemes are due by December 2026.

Expected development: Enforcement begins for large operators on 30 December 2026 and for small ones on 30 June 2027, with member state authorities running risk-based checks through 2027. The Delegated Act on product scope should be adopted in late 2026 or early 2027, pulling palm derivatives used in soaps and surfactants into due diligence for home and personal care. A revised country benchmarking with newer data is likely in 2027, and the review clause leaves room for a further legislative touch-up if the Parliament's EPP group keeps pressing for a no-risk category.

Challenges: Companies that paused EUDR projects after the first delay must rebuild plot-level traceability for smallholder cocoa and coffee before the deadline, and palm derivative users join the scope late. Repeated postponements erode board sponsorship while penalties and customs holds land in the first compliance window.

Time to impact: 0-2 years
Potential impact: High
STEEP segment: Ecological
This year's trend development: Upgraded

Summary: Mandatory recycled content under the PPWR starts in August 2026 and India's 30 percent rigid packaging rule started in April 2026, yet Europe lost close to one million tonnes of recycling capacity since 2023 and food-grade rPET carries a premium of several hundred dollars per tonne over virgin. Brands that assumed rising recycled supply at falling prices will instead compete for scarce certified material with imports of uncertain provenance.

Current situation: Plastics Recyclers Europe reported on 11 September 2025 that almost one million tonnes of capacity had closed since 2023, with zero net growth forecast for an industry of about 850 facilities and 13.2 million tonnes. Viridor closed three UK plants, Biffa closed Sunderland, Veolia closed Multipet and Multiport in Germany, and Argus counted about 250,000 tonnes a year of mechanical PET and polyolefin capacity lost in Europe in 2025 across nine shutdowns. Platts put the European food-grade rPET pellet premium over virgin at 566 dollars per tonne at the start of 2025, peaking at 836 dollars in October, while Petcore Europe cited collection costs of 450 euros per tonne or more that leave recyclers at a disadvantage to Egypt, India and China. The PPWR applies from 11 August 2026 and requires 35 percent recycled content in non-contact-sensitive non-PET packaging by 2030.

Expected development: Idle European lines can restart within 6 to 12 months, so 2027 supply depends on whether the Circular Economy Act due in 2026 and trade defence measures restore margins. Import accounting rules from 2027 determine whether Asian rPET keeps undercutting European output, and certification enforcement tightens. Brands lock multi-year rPET offtakes and invest directly in recyclers to secure 2030 compliance, raising packaging cost per unit through 2028.

Challenges: Recycled content obligations are legal while recycled supply is market-driven and volatile, leaving brands exposed to penalties beyond their control. Virgin resin oversupply keeps the economic case for recyclers weak until policy support arrives, and unmet recycled-content claims become a legal exposure under EU green claims rules.

Time to impact: 2-4 years
Potential impact: High
STEEP segment: Ecological
This year's trend development: Reframed

Summary: GLP-1 medication has moved from a niche to roughly one in eight US adults and into about a fifth to a quarter of US households, and oral formulations approved in late 2025 remove the injection barrier. Portfolio exposure to savoury snacks, soda, alcohol and bakery turns into a structural volume headwind, while high-protein, portion-controlled and fibre-rich formats gain share and apparel size curves move within a season.

Current situation: A KFF poll cited in February 2026 puts about one in eight US adults on a GLP-1, and PwC's May 2026 survey of 3,089 consumers finds 21 percent of US households include a current user, up from 9 percent in January 2025; Circana projects GLP-1 households will account for 35 percent of US food and beverage units sold by 2030. PwC measures per-household grocery spend down 5.5 percent and quick-service restaurant spend down 8.7 percent after six to eight months on the drug, with 61 percent of users buying fewer sweet treats and 56 percent fewer salty snacks, while apparel spend among users rises 9.9 percent after the same six to eight months and 73 percent report a meaningful change in clothing size. Nestle launched Vital Pursuit in 2024, its first major new US brand in nearly three decades, Conagra labels more than two dozen Healthy Choice meals as GLP-1 friendly and Danone reports double-digit growth in high-protein lines. The FDA approved Novo Nordisk's oral Wegovy pill around 22 December 2025, with Eli Lilly's pill expected in 2026.

Expected development: Oral GLP-1s widen the user base in 2027 and 2028, and Morgan Stanley projects 31.5 million US users by 2035. GLP-1 friendly becomes a standard claim architecture with retailer-led planograms, and R&D briefs add satiety, protein density, micronutrient completeness and smaller portions as default requirements. Apparel brands re-plan size curves and replenishment as customers drop sizes within a season, and GLP-1 companion claims get regulated as health claims once they spread.

Challenges: Reformulating for satiety and protein at mainstream price points squeezes margins on legacy snack lines, and demand is volatile because of high discontinuation. Health claims around GLP-1 sit close to drug-adjacent marketing and invite regulatory scrutiny, and size-curve volatility raises markdown risk for apparel.

Time to impact: 0-2 years
Potential impact: Very high
STEEP segment: Social
This year's trend development: Upgraded

Summary: Regulation (EU) 2025/40 applies from 12 August 2026 and sets binding 2030 rules on recyclability grades, recycled content, empty space, reuse and format bans. Because pack redesign lead times run two to four years, the 2030 obligations are design decisions of 2027 and 2028.

Current situation: From 12 August 2026 PFAS limits apply to food-contact packaging, e-commerce packaging may contain at most 40 percent empty space and conformity declarations and EPR registration are required, with member states setting penalties by 12 February 2027. By 1 January 2028 the Commission publishes design-for-recycling criteria, harmonised material labelling applies from 12 August 2028 and reusable-packaging labels from 12 February 2029. From 1 January 2030 all packaging must reach at least grade C, plastic packaging must contain minimum post-consumer recycled content of 30 percent for contact-sensitive PET and 35 percent for other plastics, listed formats such as fresh produce under 1.5 kg, hotel miniatures and grouped shrink wrap are banned, and reuse targets reach 40 percent for transport packaging and 10 percent for beverages. Six FMCG companies joined the PaperFlex Consortium in September 2026.

Expected development: 2027 and 2028 bring the delegated acts on recyclability criteria and the first harmonised labels, so pack specifications will be frozen for 2030 compliance by 2028. Eco-modulated EPR fees by grade from mid-2029 turn grade A versus C into a direct cost line. Recycled-content obligations collide with the retreat of chemical recycling and tight food-grade rPET supply, pushing brands toward long-term offtake agreements and mono-material designs.

Challenges: Grade thresholds and criteria arrive only in 2028, leaving two years to redesign, and food-grade recycled polyolefins barely exist at scale. Reuse targets for beverages and transport require pooling infrastructure beyond what any single company can build.

Time to impact: 2-4 years
Potential impact: Very high
STEEP segment: Political
This year's trend development: Upgraded

Summary: The 2025 to 2026 deal wave reorganised food, beverage, home care and consumer health around category focus rather than scale. The resulting companies have narrower portfolios, more debt and clearer mandates, which changes who the R&D and supply chain counterparts are across the industry.

Current situation: Unilever demerged The Magnum Ice Cream Company with a triple listing on 8 December 2025, Mars closed its acquisition of Kellanova in December 2025 creating a snacking business of about 36 billion dollars in revenue, and Ferrero closed its 3.1 billion dollar purchase of WK Kellogg on 26 September 2025. Keurig Dr Pepper completed its 18 billion dollar acquisition of JDE Peet's on 1 April 2026 and plans to split into Beverage Co and Global Coffee Co with operational readiness targeted for year-end 2026. Reckitt sold a majority of Essential Home to Advent for 4.8 billion dollars, completed 31 December 2025, Kimberly-Clark's 48.7 billion dollar acquisition of Kenvue cleared shareholder votes on 29 January 2026 with closing expected in Q4 2026, and Nestle's new CEO Philipp Navratil announced 16,000 job cuts in October 2025 with a partner search for the waters unit and a possible sale of vitamin brands.

Expected development: The KDP coffee spin and Nestle's waters and vitamins decisions land in 2027, and Kimberly-Clark's Kenvue integration runs through 2028. Newly separated companies cut shared supply chain services and renegotiate co-manufacturing and logistics contracts, creating openings for contract manufacturers and 3PLs. More category swaps in coffee, ice cream, cereal and home care follow as each group concentrates on two or three growth platforms.

Challenges: Separations carry dis-synergies in procurement scale, shared plants and IT, and the first year of standalone reporting is typically messy. Focused companies carry more leverage and less diversification against tariff or commodity shocks.

Time to impact: 2-4 years
Potential impact: Very high
STEEP segment: Economic
This year's trend development: New

Summary: The Supreme Court's February 2026 ruling ended the IEEPA tariff architecture, but the administration replaced it within days with Section 122 and then Section 301 instruments. Consumer goods importers now plan against a tariff base that changes legal foundation every few months while the headline rate stays near 10 to 12.5 percent, with Section 232 product tariffs layered on top.

Current situation: On 20 February 2026 the Supreme Court held in Learning Resources v. Trump that IEEPA does not authorise tariffs; CBP stopped collecting IEEPA duties on 24 February 2026 and a 10 percent Section 122 surcharge on all imports took effect the same day for 150 days. On 24 July 2026 a Section 301 forced-labour action replaced Section 122, charging roughly 10 percent on imports from economies with a forced-labour import ban such as the UK, India, Canada and Mexico and 12.5 percent on China and Vietnam, with Japan and South Korea charged net of existing MFN duties, and with USMCA-qualifying goods and Section 232 goods excluded and no scheduled expiry. Section 232 tariffs of 25 to 50 percent remain on steel, aluminium, copper, timber, lumber and certain furniture, CBP's refund system went live on 20 April 2026 for about 175 billion dollars of affected trade, and a separate Section 301 overcapacity investigation opened on 11 March 2026 covering 16 economies including the EU.

Expected development: The overcapacity investigation and the Vietnam IP investigation opened 29 May 2026 give the administration tools to raise country-specific rates through 2027 without Congress, and a product exclusion process modelled on 2018 to 2019 is expected. Refund litigation at the Court of International Trade runs through 2027 and decides whether non-litigant importers recover IEEPA duties. Companies should expect the 10 to 12.5 percent base to persist beyond 2027 with sector spikes under Section 232 and budget customs compliance as a permanent capability.

Challenges: Landed-cost models built on one tariff schedule break every time the legal basis shifts, and the exemption lists differ by instrument, so HTS-level classification discipline now determines margin. Refund claims require active filing that many mid-sized importers lack the process to pursue, and pricing to retailers must absorb the base rate while the overcapacity probe threatens further changes.

Time to impact: 0-2 years
Potential impact: Very high
STEEP segment: Political
This year's trend development: Upgraded

Summary: Vietnam's export boom to the US is partly Chinese-owned manufacturing moving across the border, so bilateral trade data overstate how far consumer goods sourcing has diversified. US policy now targets that pattern directly through country rates and transshipment scrutiny, which limits the value of simple China plus one strategies.

Current situation: A Federal Reserve note of 17 July 2026 found US imports from Vietnam tripled by 2025, while Chinese FDI firms' share of Vietnam's exports to the US rose from 11 percent in 2018 to 2019 to 25 percent in 2020 to 2023 and the number of Chinese-owned firms in Vietnam rose from 1,287 to 2,864. Vietnam's exports to the US reached about 112 billion dollars in January to September 2025, up nearly 27 percent, including about 16 billion dollars of textiles and garments and 8.6 billion dollars of footwear. The Section 301 forced-labour action of 24 July 2026 places Vietnam in the 12.5 percent tier alongside China, while India, Mexico and Canada sit at 10 percent and USMCA-qualifying goods are exempt, and USTR opened a Vietnam IP investigation on 29 May 2026.

Expected development: Tariff differentials between Vietnam and Mexico or India widen, favouring USMCA-qualifying Mexican assembly for durables and Indian apparel and footwear, while Chinese capital follows into those countries too. Rules-of-origin and ownership audits become the next enforcement layer by 2027 to 2028. Consumer goods companies will need supplier ownership mapping, beyond country of origin, to defend tariff positions.

Challenges: Non-Chinese capacity in apparel, footwear and small electronics remains thin outside Chinese-owned plants, so true decoupling costs more and takes longer than procurement roadmaps assume. Ownership-based scrutiny creates compliance exposure for suppliers outside incumbents' control.

Time to impact: 2-4 years
Potential impact: High
STEEP segment: Economic
This year's trend development: Reframed

Summary: Pop Mart, Mixue and Miniso posted 2025 results that show Chinese consumer brands scaling physical retail and proprietary IP abroad, with overseas revenue now above 40 percent at Pop Mart and Miniso. Western toy, beverage, beauty and lifestyle incumbents face vertically integrated competitors that control design, manufacturing and stores and win on desirability rather than discount.

Current situation: Pop Mart reported 2025 revenue of 37.12 billion yuan, up 184.7 percent, net profit of 13.01 billion yuan, gross margin of 72.1 percent, overseas revenue of 16.27 billion yuan and Americas revenue up 748.4 percent; it had 72 US stores with more than 100 planned in 2026, the Labubu franchise alone made 14.16 billion yuan, and shares fell about 30 percent after results on IP concentration worries. Mixue reported 2025 revenue of about 33.56 billion yuan, up 35.2 percent, and 59,823 stores at year end including 4,467 overseas across 13 to 14 countries. Miniso reported 2025 revenue of 21.44 billion yuan, up 26.2 percent, with overseas revenue at 44.2 percent of brand revenue, 3,583 overseas stores and 461 North American stores.

Expected development: Pop Mart's target of at least 20 percent growth in 2026 and the 100-store US plan make it a mainstream toy and collectibles competitor by 2027, while Mixue's franchise model targets thousands more overseas outlets. These brands enter adjacent categories in beauty, apparel and snacks through licensing and store-in-store formats by 2028, and licensing deals between Western CPG brands and Chinese IP owners multiply. US tariffs on Chinese and Vietnamese goods raise their landed costs, so local manufacturing or high gross margins determine who sustains the expansion.

Challenges: Incumbents compete against 70 percent gross margins and store roll-out speeds far beyond their own, and against IP cycles measured in months. Chinese players' dependence on one or two hit franchises creates volatility, which makes them unpredictable partners and competitors in licensing negotiations.

Time to impact: 2-4 years
Potential impact: High
STEEP segment: Economic
This year's trend development: Upgraded

Summary: Vertical assistants with inventory, loyalty and payment access such as Rufus and Sparky scale faster than horizontal agents and narrow the consideration set to a few products per query. The retailer's AI becomes both the recommender and a new paid-placement surface, deepening retailer power over brand discovery.

Current situation: Amazon said 300 million customers used Rufus in 2025 and attributed nearly 12 billion dollars in incremental annualised sales to it, with monthly active users up 115 percent on the 29 April 2026 earnings call. Workflow Labs found Rufus handled 38 percent of Black Friday 2025 sessions and reduces the effective field from about 50 search results to roughly five named products, Amazon's Sponsored Prompts became billable on cost-per-click bidding on 25 March 2026, and Rufus added auto-buy at a target price on 18 November 2025. Walmart reported in February 2026 that Sparky users have about 35 percent higher average order value and will run Sparky inside ChatGPT and Google Gemini, while Amazon, which captures about 40 percent of US e-commerce spending, has blocked outside agents by suing Perplexity and blocking Meta's Muse on 21 September 2026.

Expected development: By 2027 retailer assistants mediate a large share of marketplace searches, and brand visibility depends on structured backend attributes, review volume, Prime eligibility and in-stock rates rather than front-end copy. Paid prompts and conversational ad formats become a standard retail media SKU across Amazon, Walmart and European grocers by 2028. Retailer AI assistants get embedded in third-party chat platforms rather than displaced by them.

Challenges: Rufus offers no API, so brands fly blind on their inclusion rate; Workflow Labs found brands leave roughly half of backend attribute fields empty and Profitero found over 50 percent of live content wrong for many brands. Retailers can price prompts as they please, compressing brand margin further.

Time to impact: 0-2 years
Potential impact: Very high
STEEP segment: Technological
This year's trend development: Upgraded

Summary: Store brands hit record share in both the US and Europe in 2025 while Aldi accelerates US openings, so retailers now own the reference price in most grocery and household categories. National brands grow only through price, spending growth concentrates among high-income households and the middle of the assortment is where incumbents lose.

Current situation: PLMA and Circana reported US store brand sales of 282.8 billion dollars in 2025, up 3.3 percent against 1.2 percent for national brands, with unit share at a record 23.5 percent and a new record of 23.8 percent in the first half of 2026 while national-brand units fell 0.5 percent. PLMA's NielsenIQ-based report of 21 April 2026 put European private label at a record 387 billion euros for 2025 with a 38.8 percent share across 17 countries. Aldi US announced on 12 January 2026 more than 180 new stores in 2026 toward 3,200 by end 2028 backed by about 9 billion dollars of investment, and Bank of America card data show lower-income spending nearly flat into early 2026 while higher-income spending accelerated, although the Minneapolis Fed's 2026 review found the data do not tell a clear K-shaped story.

Expected development: Hard discount and private label gain further share through 2028 as tariff-driven price increases push value-seeking shoppers, and US private label unit share passes 25 percent as grocers add premium tiers in beauty, pet and refrigerated. National brands bifurcate portfolios into entry-price and premium lines by 2027 with mid-tier SKUs rationalised, which feeds the break-up and divestment wave. Pricing power from 2022 to 2025 fades as volume rather than price drives growth again.

Challenges: Incumbents sell through the same retailers that compete with them, so pricing power erodes without any visible competitor launch, and innovation that retailers can replicate within one planogram cycle earns little. Premiumisation strategies rest on a K-shape narrative the data only partly support, so over-rotation to affluent consumers is a real risk.

Time to impact: 0-2 years
Potential impact: Very high
STEEP segment: Economic
This year's trend development: Upgraded

Summary: The 2019 to 2025 price escalator converted luxury from a volume business into a concentration business and pushed out the aspirational cohort that funded brand expansion. Pricing power, long treated as the core luxury asset, now behaves as a liability, and brands are rebuilding entry tiers and rationing further increases.

Current situation: Bain-Altagamma estimates the personal luxury goods market at about 358 billion euros in 2025, down roughly 2 percent, with about 20 million consumers lost versus 2024 and an active client base of about 330 million, down from 400 million in 2022. Like-for-like iconic leather bags rose 50 to 70 percent in price between 2019 and 2025, UBS calculates that price hikes delivered half of industry sales growth in the four years after 2019, and customers spending over 20,000 euros a year now account for a little over 46 percent of spending, up from 30 percent in 2019. The Financial Times reported that average luxury price increases fell to 3 percent in January to May 2025, the lowest since 2019, and Bain's spring 2026 update says 70 percent of lapsed luxury shoppers intend to return but not necessarily to the same brands.

Expected development: Bain forecasts personal luxury goods growth of 2 to 4 percent in 2026 and 4 to 6 percent a year from 2026 to 2035, which implies recovery through customer re-acquisition rather than price. 2027 to 2028 assortments re-weight toward ready-to-wear, small leather goods and sub-1,000 euro entry points, with ready-to-wear already growing about twice as fast as leather goods in 2026. Brands that keep raising prices above inflation trade share for margin, and the gap between top-client-dependent houses and broad-based houses widens in reported results.

Challenges: Lowering effective price points without diluting the top tier requires separate product architectures, store formats and clienteling, which doubles complexity. Finance teams have modelled growth on price-mix for six years, and hero launches of iconic bags fell 70 to 80 percent in 2023 to 2025 versus 2016 to 2019, so the product engine itself needs re-investment.

Time to impact: 0-2 years
Potential impact: Very high
STEEP segment: Economic
This year's trend development: Reframed

Summary: Directive 2024/825 on Empowering Consumers for the Green Transition applies from 27 September 2026 and blacklists generic environmental claims, offset-based climate claims and uncertified sustainability labels across all consumer goods. Enforcement runs through unfair commercial practice law, so claims risk moves from reputational to litigable, while the separate Green Claims Directive has stalled since June 2025.

Current situation: Member state implementing regulations such as Ireland's SI 124 of 2026 apply from 27 September 2026 to any product on shelf or online for EU consumers. Prohibited practices include green or eco-friendly claims without demonstrated excellent performance such as EU Ecolabel or an ISO 14024 Type I label, carbon neutral or reduced emissions claims that rely on offsetting, sustainability labels not based on a certification scheme or public body, and false or omitted durability and repairability information. In the UK, the DMCC Act gave the CMA direct fining powers, its first penalty of 473,000 pounds came in early 2026 and it sent 100 advisory letters on fake reviews across 14 sectors in November 2025, while the EU Green Claims Directive has been in limbo since the Commission signalled withdrawal on 20 June 2025 without formally withdrawing it.

Expected development: The first enforcement cases and representative actions on carbon neutral and generic claims appear in 2027, with cosmetics, apparel and food packaging the likely targets given label density. Brands strip offset-based climate neutral claims from EU packs through 2027 and shift to certified labels, which concentrates demand on EU Ecolabel and a handful of ISO 14024 schemes. The CMA's first substantive consumer-law fines, up to 10 percent of global turnover, set the UK price of a misleading claim in 2027.

Challenges: Global packaging artwork with one claim set for all markets breaks down, and substantiation files must exist per claim per SKU. Marketing teams lose their most used vocabulary at the same time as EPR fees reward the same attributes, so the shift is to verifiable attribute claims such as recycled content percentage or repairability class.

Time to impact: 0-2 years
Potential impact: High
STEEP segment: Political
This year's trend development: Reframed

Summary: Resale has left the niche phase, with platforms above 1 billion euros revenue and social discovery replacing search. Supply rather than demand is now the constraint, which hands brands with trade-in access a lever and exposes brands that lack it.

Current situation: ThredUp's 14th Resale Report of April 2026 projects the global secondhand apparel market at 393 billion dollars by 2030, about 10 percent of apparel spend, growing roughly twice as fast as overall apparel; the US market grew nearly four times faster than retail clothing in 2025, Gen Z and millennials account for 71 percent of growth and nearly 50 percent of shoppers discover secondhand through social and creator feeds. Vinted reported 2025 revenue of 1.1 billion euros, up 38 percent, on GMV of 10.8 billion euros, while net profit fell 19 percent to 62 million euros as it invested in Germany, new markets and Vinted Go logistics. Pacsun launched PS Vintage in 16 US stores in April 2026 with 20 percent sell-through in top stores, and Faherty added in-store trade-in at all stores in March 2026.

Expected development: Platforms race to unlock supply, so trade-in incentives, AI listing tools and in-store intake become standard in apparel, footwear and consumer electronics by 2028. Vinted's margin compression shows the land-grab phase continues through 2027 with US entry as the next battleground. Textile EPR fees from 2028 strengthen resale economics because secondhand-only sellers are exempt under California's law and resale extends the fee-bearing product's life.

Challenges: Brand-owned resale cannibalises full-price sales in the same store and depends on authentication and refurbishment costs that scale poorly. Marketplace discovery is shifting to social feeds outside the brand's control, and the supply flywheel depends on customer trade-in relationships that incumbents lack.

Time to impact: 2-4 years
Potential impact: High
STEEP segment: Economic
This year's trend development: Reframed

Summary: The 60-plus cohort already spends 19 trillion of 70 trillion dollars in global consumption and heads to one in three dollars by 2036, with Asia-Pacific the fastest growing region. Beauty, health products and smart-home assistance grow faster for this cohort than any mass-market category, and social commerce is the surprising channel.

Current situation: World Data Lab, NielsenIQ and Silver Economy count 1.2 billion people aged 60 and over in 2025, rising to 2.1 billion by 2050, and put 60-plus spending at 19 trillion dollars in 2026, 27 percent of total, reaching 34 trillion dollars by 2036. Regional 60-plus spending runs North America 7.4 trillion dollars rising to 11.7 trillion by 2036, Asia-Pacific 4.9 trillion rising to 10.2 trillion and Europe 5.4 trillion rising to 8.6 trillion, while silver economy products and services total 4.5 trillion dollars growing about 7 percent a year against about 3 percent for all consumer spending. US 60-plus category growth to 2036 is led by health products at 5.9 percent, home help 5.7 percent and beauty 5.6 percent, age tech grows 12 to 17 percent a year, adults 55 and over make up 34.5 percent of health and beauty buyers on TikTok Shop and 51 percent of older Americans say they feel younger than their age.

Expected development: Asia-Pacific overtakes Europe in 60-plus spending by 2036, so Japan, China and Korea become the lead markets for age-inclusive formats, packaging and nutrition. Beauty, OTC and household brands re-segment by life stage rather than age by 2030, with social commerce as a mainstream channel for the over-55s. Osteoporosis-related products alone are projected at 48 billion dollars by 2030.

Challenges: Older consumers shift spend toward medical products, insurance and home ownership and away from clothing and restaurants, so growth sits in categories outside most CPG portfolios. Age-coded marketing repels a cohort that self-identifies as younger, which makes product cues harder to get right than demographics suggest.

Time to impact: 4-6 years
Potential impact: High
STEEP segment: Social
This year's trend development: New

Twelve trends reach very high potential impact in this report. Leading them are retailer-owned AI shopping assistants, private label and hard discount setting the price ceiling, GLP-1 households as the largest packaged food demand shift since low-fat, the US tariff patchwork, PPWR's 2030 packaging rules, commodity boom-bust cycles, and the exit of aspirational luxury buyers.

21% of US households included a GLP-1 user by May 2026, up from 9% in January 2025. These households cut grocery spend by 5.5% and buy fewer sweet and salty snacks, while apparel spend rises as sizes change. Oral pills approved in late 2025 widen the user base further. The effect is a mix shift rather than a cliff, because half to three quarters of users stop within a year, so portfolios need on-drug, off-drug, and never-user formats at once.

In order of arrival: the EU green claims ban from 27 September 2026, PPWR from 12 August 2026 with 2030 recyclability and recycled content targets, EUDR enforcement from 30 December 2026, US packaging EPR invoices in California, Oregon, and Colorado from January 2027, the US synthetic dye deadline at end-2027, the EU Forced Labour Regulation from 14 December 2027, and textile EPR across EU member states by April 2028.

A US tariff base near 10 to 12.5% that can change instrument within weeks, Vietnam placed in the same tariff tier as China, commodity whipsaw in cocoa, coffee, and orange juice, a European recycling base that lost close to one million tonnes of capacity since 2023, Cape of Good Hope routing as the shipping baseline, and cyberattacks that halted M&S for months and cost the UK an estimated £1.9 billion in the Jaguar Land Rover case.

Most large consumer goods companies run trend scouting in dedicated innovation or foresight software rather than in slide decks. ITONICS is one such platform: teams import a trend set like this one, rate each trend on impact and time to impact, and link it to the projects, products, and suppliers it affects, so a change in a trend’s rating shows up on the roadmap it threatens. The 89 trends on this page can be imported directly from the download above.

Four things decide whether a trend tool gets used after the first quarter: a rating model the whole organisation applies the same way, links from trends to projects and roadmaps so exposure is visible, AI that monitors sources and drafts updates rather than only summarising, and an import and export path so trend sets move between teams and suppliers. Tools that only store trend cards become archives within a year.