September 2008
The ups and downs of air travel

Put 300 plus people in a really small space for a number of hours; expect many of them to sleep upright; feed them en masse (or not at all if it's budget); subject them to each other's snores, coughs, laughter, slurps and worse – and you're going to have a hard time keeping everyone happy. Sounds quite tough when you put it like that. Indeed, airlines face a considerable customer service challenge...keeping us all happy in the skies. Some of them rise to the challenge and some fail. Sometimes the difference can be a smile, sometimes it needs a lot more than that to create loyalty. Airlines with strong brands are invariably forgiven more, but do passengers even care about branding when all they want to do is get from A to B?

March 2008
Cents and sensibility: Global attitudes to cash

Whether you have a lot of it or a little; whether you think it buys happiness or is simply a necessary evil; whether you are a marketer, or consumer (or both!)... money is universal. Understanding consumers' attitudes to money is a good starting point for anyone trying to sell something (and that's most of us in one way or another!) and becomes even more important in times where money and markets are a little uncertain.

April 2007
The climate is changing... but will consumer behaviour?

Climate change is news all over the world. You only have to pick up a paper or stand by the water cooler to know it's a hot issue with world leaders, celebrities and regular people alike. But will all this talk lead to changing consumer behaviour? Marketers need to know. Synovate, together with BBC World, took a look at climate change in a global survey spanning 21 markets on six continents and discovered that more than two thirds of respondents were concerned about climate change. Even more significantly for the world's marketers, 95% of these people had personally done something to reduce the effects of climate change in the past year.

November 2006
Rich insights into low income consumers

Low income consumers in the world's emerging markets want many of the same things out of life and the same quality in their products as middle class consumers and differ mainly in their purchasing behaviour, according to a recent global study by Synovate. Combining quantitative data with the deeper insights from a qualitative approach, Synovate surveyed over 8,000 consumers in 14 'Hotspots' markets around the world to gain a better understanding of their attitudes, values and purchasing habits.

September 2006
Will new air travel restrictions keep travellers closer to home?

The new restrictions at airports will deter some consumers from air travel but it's the ongoing threat of terrorism that will have a greater effect on their travel habits, according to a new survey by Synovate. Synovate surveyed 1,481 people in the United States, United Kingdom, Czech Republic, Hungary, Bulgaria, Singapore and Australia who have travelled by air in the past year to get their thoughts on the additional air travel security restrictions that have been imposed in recent weeks due to threats of terrorism.

February 2006
Bird Flu: Is anyone ducking the issue?

Almost half of Indonesians and Turks have stopped eating chicken as a result of the threat of bird flu, a recent Synovate survey has discovered. Americans and Canadians, on the other hand, have not lost their taste for poultry, which is also true of close to half of respondents in Hong Kong and Thailand.

October 2005
Coping with fears of terrorism

WHILE 84% of Americans fear a terrorist attack on the US in the near future, only 27% say their country is well prepared to handle the situation. A recent Synovate survey across 13 markets confirmed that citizens of countries which have been attacked in the past worry more about a possible recurrence. The fear is highest in the UK, which was jolted by the public transport bombings in July. Nine out of 10 UK respondents said they expect another terrorist incident, the highest among all markets which took part in the study.

April 2005
Who cares about the environment

Do you gaze out your window every day at a sky full of smog? Or do you live on the edge of a pristine wilderness? One thing's for sure, thanks to the ongoing efforts of activists, our threatened environment will be a subject that's never far from your awareness.

November 2004
UK students dissected

Earlier this year, Synovate released the results of a recent study by Project Edge, an ongoing contextual trends monitor managed by the UK's youth research division. The research took a look at a fast growing segment of the UK population: students — specifically, Britain's 2,175,115 undergraduates.