Iftar Gathering and Shopping Trends in Ramadan

In Ramadan and Eid al-Fitr 2023, Jakpat, published a series of survey results to see the habits and behavior of Muslim consumers during this moment. In part 3 of the report entitled “Iftar Gathering, Shopping, and Eid Fashion Style“, Jakpat presents data from 1365 Muslim respondents, both male and female, from various regions in Indonesia. The age of respondents are ranging from 15 to 49 years. The report highlights respondents’ shopping habits during Ramadan, including buying new clothes. In addition, it will also discuss about one of the events that many people are waiting for this month, namely breaking the fast together or popularly called bukber.

Bukber in Private Homes

In Indonesia, breaking the fast together (bukber) is one of the things to look forward to in Ramadan. Many Muslims plan several bukber during the month; one with extended family, one with elementary school friends, junior high school friends, high school friends, college, coworkers, and others. However, this trend had dropped in several years during the pandemic and began to rise again last year.

“Along with the pandemic trend that continues to decline in 2023, the proportion of people who are interested in participating in bukber increases when compared to 2022 data. It’s just that at the same time, people’s purchasing power is still affected by inflation conditions or layoffs since 2022, so it can be seen that this year the trend of bukber in private homes has increased, while the trend of bukber in hotels, restaurants in malls, or outdoor restaurants has decreased.”  According to Aska Primardi, Head of Research Jakpat.

This year, more than 50% of people attended iftar gatherings in private homes. Iftar at hotels accounted for only 7%, decreased at about 5% from last year. “After we dig deeper, it turns out that this is related to the budget for bukber, where the average budget is still lower than the price of bukber packages at hotels,” Aska added.

Buying New Clothes Online

In the second week of Ramadan 2023, 7 out of 10 respondents plan or even have bought new clothes for Eid al-Fitr celebrations. The majority of respondents bought 2 pieces of clothes with an average budget of IDR 178,675 per piece. For them, it turns out that buying new clothes is quite important. Unlike the case with respondents who plan to wear old clothes for Eid al-Fitr, where around 80% consider buying new clothes is less or even unimportant.

Although the pandemic-related situation is more under control this year, respondents do not necessarily switch to offline shopping at malls, stores, or markets. Shopping online is still the choice for more than half of respondents who plan to buy clothes or other fashion products, with Shopee being the most popular place to buy clothes. Tokopedia and Lazada were also used by some respondents to buy some complementary items, such as shoes, hijab, or peci; although most still also choose Shopee to shop for these needs.

But if we talk about food products, most of the people still choose to buy them directly from stores, supermarkets, markets, and so on. Including buying cakes and cookies that are currently popular on social media platforms and e-commerce too.

How Gen Z Plans for Ramadan & Eid Al-Fitr in 2023?

Ahead of the holy month of Ramadan, most Generation Z (Gen Z) are planning to increase their spending budgets in 2023 compared to 2022. So one of the findings in the report released by Jakpat, entitled Welcoming 2023 Ramadan and Eid. This report presents the results of a survey to 1034 Muslim respondents throughout Indonesia, especially in the Greater Jakarta area and Java area. Respondents consisted of 50% women and 50% men, as well as 34% of Gen Z, 48% of Millennials, and 18% of Gen X.

“Most of the Millennials segment also stated similar plans to Gen Z, namely to budget more than 2022 for Ramadan and Eid al-Fitr needs this year, it’s just that there are still some Millennials who allocate the same amount of budget compared to 2022. The increase in Gen Z’s budget could be driven by the fact that Gen Z is starting to have enough personal income and savings from their work,” explained Aska Primardi, Head of Research Jakpat.

Aska also added, “In addition to fulfilling religious obligations such as fasting and paying zakat, another activity that many people want to do in Ramadan, especially Gen Z, is to participate in iftar gathering events. After the pandemic is over, it seems that the longing to gather and break fasting together is unstoppable, so everyone wants to gather in an iftar gathering event. This is what is welcomed by all restaurant and hotel business actors who have since started promoting iftar gathering activities in their places.”

If not attending iftar gatherings or bukber, 54% of Gen Z claim to be interested in using food delivery services to prepare food for iftar. However, the interest of Gen Z is still relatively lower when compared to the older generation, Millennials and Gen X.

Gen Z and Ramadan & Eid Traditions

As is common during Ramadan and Eid al-Fitr, where Muslims often wear new clothes during the celebration day, most people plan to buy clothes (88%), prayer equipment (66%), footwear (60%), and fashion accessories (55%) this year. In addition, in Gen Z, interest in buying beauty products is also quite high (45%) when compared to the older segment. People also tend to shop online, especially for fashion products. However, for the purchase  of hampers or Ramadan and Eid al-Fitr gifts, the majority of people claim to buy directly from the store.

The giving of hampers is done to show affection which in recent years has become increasingly popular due to the Covid-19 pandemic. According to the survey results in the 2022 Ramadan and Eid al-Fitr report by Jakpat, giving hampers is a substitute for physical presence when experiencing limitations to meet with other people directly. However, about 1 in 5 young people (Gen Z and Millennials) also consider  giving hampers as a symbol of social status. In Ramadan and Eid al-Fitr this year, 34% of Gen Z plan to prepare a budget to buy hampers. The budget prepared by the majority of Gen Z is no more than Rp250,000 for each package of hamper. Even 28% of Gen Z prepare a budget below Rp100,000 for each package.These hampers will generally be in the form of cookies and then followed by ready-to-eat foods, such as kue basah or traditional snacks, cakes, side dishes, and bread.