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There Is No Average CEE Shopper
Seven markets. Seven different shopper realities. One dataset built to show you exactly how each one behaves — not how a regional average behaves.
Supporting line: Real purchase behavior, shopper opinions, and retailer evaluations from YouGov's continuous shopper panels across Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, Serbia, and Slovakia.
Reply directly or contact Hana Rihova — Hana.Rihova@yougov.com
The "CEE shopper" doesn't exist.
Regional shopper is a statistical fiction. Each market has fundamentally different economic context, retail structure, income pressures, and purchase dynamics. Bulgarian isn't Romanian. Czech isn't Croatian.
Proper understanding how shoppers plan, choose, switch and respond to value shows up as:
- Well converted trade marketing budget spent on promotions
- Positioning and pricing calibrated for an actual shopper sentiment
- Retailer negotiations built on local shopper behavior and expectations
- Fast reaction to structural shifts already visible in the data — e.g. discounter growth, growing loyalty, changing value perceptions
It's about the right data, at the market level, that reflects what shoppers actually do
YouGov's #Shopper2026 report is built on three layers of data, capturing trends over a longer time horizon:
- Real purchase behavior: Actual, purchased data on what shoppers buy, where, how often, and at what price — captured continuously through YouGov's shopper panels, not reconstructed from memory in a survey.
- Shopper opinions and attitudes: How shoppers perceive value, respond to different retailers' offers and selling strategies, and describe their decision-making — layered directly on top of what they actually did.
- Retailer evaluations: How shoppers rate and compare the retailers competing for their basket — accessibility, convenience, price perception, loyalty program strength, assortment quality.
One data source matters: Purchased data tells you what happened. Opinion tells you why.
The long-term view identifies significant changes: shifts like Bulgaria's move from deal-hunting to everyday value, or Serbia's accelerating discounter growth. A continuous panel captures them as they're forming — which brings the difference between reacting to a trend and planning ahead of it.
Market spotlight
Each market report explores a key focus area shaping shopper behavior today:
- Bulgaria – Shoppers are redefining affordability, shifting from deal hunting toward everyday value.
- Czech Republic & Slovakia – Promotions remain an important driver of purchase decisions, but effectiveness varies heavily across retailers, categories and brands.
- Serbia – Changing shopper behavior is reshaping the retail landscape and accelerating the growth of discounters.
- Croatia – Loyalty is becoming a more important driver of retailer success than shopper reach alone.
- Hungary – Convenience, Price, or Quality? – What Drives Store Choice?
- Romania – Economic pressure is reshaping shopper behavior while retailers strengthen loyalty programs to defend growth.
One market. Full picture.
Each of the seven YouGov Shopper 2026 reports gives you a detailed understanding of the trends shaping each market:
- Macroeconomic and FMCG market trends
- Trade and retail chains development
- Shopping behavior and long-term shopper trends, shopping missions
- Reactions to changing prices, promotions and private label development
- Shopping basket composition and importance of categories
- Retailers' performance, switching, and shoppers' satisfaction
- Shoppers' attitudes and typologies
- Country-specific trends and growth opportunities
*Publication delivered as a pdf.
Get the report for your market.
Seven markets. Seven shopper realities.
Reply directly or contact Hana Rihova — Hana.Rihova@yougov.com