What Québec Wants™

Sun-Haters in Quebec?

Mark Penn, better known as Hilary Clinton’s chief strategist who predicted she would clinch the nomination with the California primaries, wrote a book about microtrends (Microtrend: the small forces behind tomorrow’s big changes, Hachette Book Group USA, 2007). While his credibility as a trend watcher may have taken a hit, he’s credited with having identified “soccer moms” as a crucial constituency in President Clinton’s 1996 reelection campaign.

His book lists more than seventy such microtrends in the US – trends that are wielding great influence on politics and business that marketers can tap into. Penn claims that only one percent, or three million people, is enough to launch a business or social movement. I’ll review some of these trends and look for signs that they offer similar opportunities in Quebec.

Microtrend: Sun-Haters

These are the people who greet summer sunshine with floppy hats that look like Snoopy’s World War I bomber gear (complete with earflaps), grudgingly show up at pool parties in full-body wetsuits, and slather on fourteen layers of 50+ sunscreen just to go to work.

Sun-Haters have spawned an industry for sun-safe clothing, which means long-sleeved shirts and pants that are woven more tightly than regular clothes. They’re also triggering innovations that build sun protection into our daily lives. Just coming on to the market is a product called Sun-Guard, a laundry aid that washes sun protection right into clothes, boosting their UPF level from 5 to 30.

We took a look at Quebeckers’ usage of suntan and sunscreen products based on PMB data.

Sun-Haters use self-tanners, which work with the skin to alter skin colour without the risk of UV exposure. This microtrend is apparently responsible for the tremendous growth of these products in recent years. And Quebeckers are significantly more likely to use self-tanners (3.9% of adults 18+ in English Canada use self tanners compared to 6.3% in French Quebec – 114 index).

But before you jump to the conclusion that Quebeckers are more likely to be Sun-Haters than Canadians in the ROC, look at the more complete picture.

Quebeckers are significantly more likely to use suntan oil (144 index). They’re significantly less likely to use sunscreen products (89 index) and sunscreen with a high SPF of 36+ (52 index).

It should therefore not be a surprise that Quebeckers are significantly more likely to use sunburn and after sun products (126 index).

The days of the face tanners that literally fried your face might be over but this data suggest that Quebeckers are not yet as inclined to hate the sun.

Father's Day in Quebec. Where's the gift?

The newspaper La Presse reported this week that the fashion world has determined that narrower ties are making a comeback – from 10 cm wide to 9 cm.

According to Jerry Balest from Macy’s (quoted in the La Presse article – the translation is mine), narrower ties reflect a more youthful attitude. “People are in better shape, they exercise and they want to show that they’re taking better care of themselves”. With narrower ties? Something must have gotten lost in the translation into French and back to English.

Which brings us to today, Father’s Day.

A few revealing stats:

According to a survey by Ipsos Reid conducted in June 2005 for Canon Canada, Quebeckers are no more and no less likely to forget Father’s Day. (23% in Quebec say they have forgotten in the past compared to 24% nationally, 23% in Ontario, 21% in the Maritimes, 22% in the Prairies, 29% in Alberta and 24% in B.C.)

However, what’s most interesting is Quebeckers’ answer to this question:

Thinking back to various gift-giving holidays in the past, which one of your parents did you usually put more thought into buying for… (a) mom, (b) dad, (c) same amount for each, (d) don’t know/refused.

Quebeckers are significantly less likely to say “mom” than Canadians in the ROC. (46% say mom in Quebec compared to 56% nationally and as high as 61% in Ontario)

Yet dads don’t get more attention in Quebec. In fact, they get less attention when it comes to gifts on Father’s Day. (9% in Quebec compared to 13% nationally and 15% in Ontario). Significantly more Quebeckers answered don’t know or refused to answer.

The reason is simple. Quebeckers generally give fewer gifts to fewer people of lower value than do Canadian in the ROC . And it seems that Father’s Day is no exception.

Dads of Quebec looking for narrower ties – get your own.

It must be true.

There was big news yesterday from Radio-Canada with the announcement that Celine Galipeau would become the lead anchor of its nightly news broadcast. Celine Galipeau is a seasoned journalist known for her comprehensive and insightful coverage from Moscow and Beijing. She was born in Longueuil, Quebec to a French-Canadian father who was a diplomat and a Vietnamese mother. She replaces Bernard Derome who has defined TV news in the province for over three decades.

Some anchors "read" the news, others seem to "tell" the news. I've always felt that Bernard Derome’s familiar and less formal delivery of the news made the content more credible as if he was personally vetting the news.

It's perhaps one of the reasons why Quebeckers appear to trust media news reports more so than Canadians in the ROC. A recent Ipsos-Reid survey  on behalf of the Canadian Journalism Foundation (May 2008) asked Canadians which of the following two statements about the news media they agree with more:

(1) The news media’s primary goal is to find and broadcast the truth.

(2) The news media’s primary goal is to run a business and to make money.

Significantly more Quebeckers (62%) said that the news media’s primary goal is to find and broadcast the truth. (54% in Ontario and as low as 38% in the Prairies)

That's consistent with findings from the Yankelovich Monitor ten years ago. Asked whether they agreed or disagreed with the statement “I am skeptical about the accuracy of news stories and information presented in the media”, 75% of English Canadians agreed compared to 63% of French Canadians.

It must be true if they say it.

Trespassing and banking

I spotted two strategically located posters in Toronto and Montreal this week.

Ikea is intercepting people shopping for mattresses right in front of Sleep Country Canada’s new store at the corner of The Queensway and Kipling.

In Montreal, Laurentian Bank seems to have scouted every competitor’s branch in Montreal’s downtown core with the message “T’es sur d’avoir choisi la bonne banque?” (Are you sure you’ve chosen the right bank?).

This message is likely to be a tougher sell in Quebec than it would be in English Canada given Quebeckers’ apparent stronger loyalty to their financial institution.

Ipsos Reid’s Canadian Account Habits conducted for RBC in 2006 revealed that significantly more Quebeckers (60%) still had an account with the FI where they opened their first account (compared to 42% in Ontario and as low as 31% in the Prairies.) The same survey revealed that the main reason for opening the account at the time was as a “school account” among 5% of Quebeckers compared to 1% for the national average. And when asked about the person who taught them the most about managing money and saving when they were a child, 8% said their teacher compared to 3% for the national average. Maybe they should target teachers instead…

More on beer marketing & national pride.

As I suggested in a previous post (Identity, pride and marketing in Quebec, May 23, 2008), leveraging pride to sell beer in Quebec appears to be an effective strategy even when Quebec’s national identity is being hotly debated following the release of the Bouchard-Taylor report. This poster for Labatt Bleue is all over Montreal in anticipation of the June 24th "Fete Nationale". The headline reads: "We are all Quebeckers, even in Montreal".

According to 2006 Stats Can data, there are 3.5 million people living in the greater Montreal area (CMA). Close to 600,000 residents are in a visible minority group. And 740,000 are immigrants (defined as people born outside Canada).

Compare this to the small town of Herouxville (pop. 1,225), which was at the centre of the so-called reasonable accommodations debate: 0% visible minorities and 0% immigrants.

I suspect this poster won’t show up in Herouxville’s local bars.

From the French Paradox to the Quebecois Paradox

According to Wikipedia, the French paradox refers to “the observation that the French suffer a relatively low incidence of coronary heart disease, despite having a diet relatively rich in saturated fats. When a description of this paradox was aired in the United States on 60 Minutes in 1991 with the proposal that red wine, or alcohol, decreases the incidence of cardiac diseases, the consumption of red wine increased 44%.”

Some health researchers now question the validity of this paradox. Statistics collected by the WHO from 1990-2000 show that the incidence of heart disease in France may have been underestimated.

Instead of focusing on heart disease among the French, let’s take a look at the BMI (Body Mass Index) of Canadians.

In 2003, Statistics Canada and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention conducted study called the Joint Canada/United States Survey of Health. The findings confirmed that obesity rates are more prevalent in the United States than in Canada. While there were no significant differences between American and Canadian men, 20% of women 18+ in the US were obese compared to 11.9% of women 18+ in Canada.

What about the differences in BMI among Canadians?

Stats Can reports on the BMI of Canadians by province for 1998/1999. Rather than look at obesity, we’ll focus on what is defined as “acceptable weight” (20.0-24.9 BMI). 42% of the Canadian population falls in this group. This percentage drops to 34.2% in Newfoundland, which incidentally is the province with the highest percentage of its population in the “overweight” BMI range (27.0 and over). Quebec, with its foie gras and poutine, is the province with the highest percentage of its population in the “acceptable weight” BMI range (46.4%). B.C. is close second with 44.9% but it’s also the province with the highest percentage of its population in the “underweight” BMI range. I’ll leave it to others to explain the diet of the folks living in British Columbia and confirm or dispel the “granola-eating-mountain-biker” image.

The situation in Quebec is most interesting. There are of course several factors that are responsible for healthy weights. But data from an Ipsos-Reid survey last July may offer part of the answer. Quebeckers were significantly less likely to skip breakfast, lunch or dinner. They were also least likely to say they snack a few times a day. Which may explain why, in a Yankelovich study fielded in 1998, Quebeckers were significantly more likely to agree with the statement “I eat what I want and give little thought to my weight”.

Abraham Lincoln once said:

Do not worry; eat three square meals a day; say your prayers; be courteous to your creditors; keep your digestion good; exercise; go slow and easy. Maybe there are other things your special case requires to make you happy; but, my friend, these I reckon will give you a good life.

It’s somewhat ironic that Quebeckers appear to be following his advice more closely (prayers aside) than dashboard-dining Americans obsessed with fat free food and miracle diets.