Entertainment barometer

Quebecers and entertainment in times of COVID-19 (edition 2, May 2020)

June 2, 2020

One month ago, Habo and Lepointdevente.com published the first edition of the Entertainment Barometer, a longitudinal study that analyzes the evolution of the attitudes of Quebec entertainment consumers regarding the current pandemic.

One month later, what has changed? How has the consumers’ state of mind evolved? And how can the players in the leisure, tourism and culture sectors prepare to support consumers in a return to a certain form of normality?

The results of the second wave of research, conducted in mid-May with 1,028 entertainment consumers in Quebec, provide some answers to these questions.

What is the state of mind of entertainment consumers at the present time?

The results shed light on 3 key insights:

In general, the perception of deprivation of entertainment activities was exacerbated during the last month. This is true for almost all entertainment activities, and especially for restaurants and festivals.
The consumer’s level of concern has decreased overall regarding attendance at entertainment activities, particularly for museums and outdoor attractions. The effect of time, combined with the gradual deconfinement measures, is reassuring for the players in the industry, even though between 40% and 75% of consumers remain very or somewhat concerned.
Although the level of concern has decreased, the timeframe before a level of comfort with entertainment activities has remained relatively stable compared to last month (between 3.4 and 6.3 months, depending on the entertainment activities). This is less encouraging than the first two insights, because it would have been logical for these indicators to decrease by 1 month compared to the study conducted in mid-April 2020. However, for certain activities, such as museums or restaurants, nearly 40% of consumers would be ready to attend them upon their reopening.

To reassure consumers, what are the most effective mitigation measures for each sector of the entertainment industry?

Offering flexibility regarding the options of cancellation or refund remains essential to induce consumers to buy tickets for a show, a festival or a sporting event.

Beyond this, the most effective measures to communicate are:

For museums – a visitor experience that allows physical distancing during the visit (respect for the 2-metre distance rule, sign-posted route, access control to avoid long queues);
For indoor shows – an emphasis on disinfection measures (carefully disinfected site, availability of hand sanitizer gel, possible availability of instant COVID-19 tests on site at the entrance);
For sporting events and festivals – above all, public health department approval of the holding of the event, and access control to prevent crowds from gathering;
For restaurants – physical distance between tables, a limited number of people and access by time slot to avoid queues (all reinforce by public health department approval).

And now?

While the first edition took the pulse of consumers in the eye of the cyclone (mid-April 2020) and the second edition captures consumers’ feelings while the deconfinement measures are specified (mid-May 2020), the next edition of the Barometer (mid-June 2020) will make it possible to see a trend of the different indicators through 3 time periods.

The purpose of this study is to stimulate a discussion among the players in the entertainment and leisure industry – employees, companies, media. Your point of view is important so that this contact has a tangible and actionable impact on the success of the resumption strategies. Don’t hesitate to send us your questions, ideas and observations.

Do you want to know more?

A detailed report of the study is downloadable below.

For any additional information, you can contact us here.

Methodology

This study was conducted online with 1,028 people living in Quebec, selected at random among ticket buyers of the Lepointdevente.com website since 2017. Data was gathered between May 13 and 22, 2020. Quotas were established to build a sample comparable to the structure of the Quebec population in terms of gender, age and region of residence.