By Rakhee Naik. Your deal hunter and your premium shopper are mostly in the same room. New consumer data is making that hard to ignore, and it’s a problem for brands still building separate strategies for “premium” and “value” shoppers as two different audiences.
Two numbers don’t sit comfortably alongside each other. While 55% of South African adults say they tend to choose premium products and services, 85% say that whenever they shop, they make sure to use available sales, coupons and deals.
These findings come from YouGov Profiles+ data, which tracks internet-connected South African adults aged 18+, and were analysed by consumer insights agency KLA.
At these levels, neither behaviour can be considered niche. Put them side by side and the old split — premium audience over here, value audience over there — stops making sense. It’s largely the same audience.
The overlap is real
The crosstabs make the point clearly. Among the hardest bargain hunters in the sample — those who definitely agree they are usually looking for the lowest price — two-thirds still describe themselves as premium choosers. And of the consumers who say they definitely don’t mind paying extra for good quality, 94% still use sales and coupons.
So this isn’t a market split into spenders and savers. It’s more that people are running two definitions of value at the same time.For deal seekers, value shows up as price efficiency. For premium choosers, it shows up as quality and experience. Neither group looks careless with money.
Which raises the more useful question: if the dividing line is not how much people are prepared to spend, what is it?
It’s not about demographics
Income alone doesn’t explain it. Middle-income South Africans are the most deal-hungry of the income groups, with 91% saying they use the sales and coupons available to them, and at the same time they are the most willing to pay more for quality, at 90%. That group is not choosing between the two behaviours, it’s doing both at once. Even among consumers with the least disposable income, three-quarters still say they do not mind paying more for good quality.
Age doesn’t explain it either. Millennials and Gen X sit just above the national figure for choosing premium, at 60% and 57% respectively. Gen Z is the lowest of the three at 47%, but the detail worth noting is where that gap comes from. Their outright disagreement matches the national rate exactly, and what sets them apart is the 38% who neither agree nor disagree. That reads as an undecided group rather than a resistant one.
What separates the premium buyer looks more like disposition than demographics. Among those who identify most strongly as premium purchasers, 73% definitely agree that their foremost priority in life is enjoyment. 89% are prepared to pay more for luxury brands, and 71% say they frequently buy beautiful things they don’t need. That profile suggests an enjoyment-driven shopper rather than simply a wealthy one, and the distinction ought to change how brands talk to them.
One journey, two motivations
On loyalty programmes, 95% of committed premium choosers agree that they are a good way for brands to reward their customers. Among those who reject premium outright, agreement also runs high, at 81%. It is one of the propositions in this dataset that both ends of the market actively endorse. Price messaging separates these groups as does the creative, but a rewards mechanism reaches both.
The path to purchase is also shared. Browsing online is the most common step for both groups. Both research heavily before committing: 86% of committed premium choosers say they never make a big purchase without being well informed, and among the most price-driven consumers, that figure is 87% — only one point apart. Premium is not the considered route and deals the impulsive one, on these measures, it’s the same route.
Where the groups actually diverge is in what catches their attention along the way. Offers on social media and TV commercials perform strongly across the data. Among the most committed premium choosers, however, branded email is noticed by 61%, slightly ahead of social media at 60% and TV at 56%. Among those who reject premium, branded email drops to 36%. A similar pattern appears across online newsletters, mobile commercials and billboards, with these formats attracting more attention among premium-inclined consumers.
The physical store is also important. Among consumers who definitely say they leave shops with unplanned purchases, 67% are premium choosers, compared with 37% of shoppers who are neutral about making unplanned purchases. For all the focus on digital performance, the supermarket aisle remains an important place to influence premium-inclined shoppers.
Advertising has a creative problem
Then there is advertising itself — here’s where the data turns uncomfortable.
Premium consumers do not enjoy advertising any more than anyone else does. Among those who find it definitely annoying, 70% are premium choosers, barely different from the 66% found among consumers who are not annoyed by it at all. There is no ad-loving premium segment hiding in this data. Among consumers who definitely feel bombarded by ads, 85% are hard-core price hunters, against 58% of those neutral on the question. However, the usual response to a deal-driven customer is to serve more offers, more frequently. The data suggests they may already feel they are seeing too much.
What is also interesting to note is that among consumers who strongly feel their lifestyle is not represented in advertising, 81% describe themselves as premium choosers. Among those neutral on the question, it’s 30%. Premium-inclined consumers are therefore seeing advertising, but many don’t feel represented by it.
That points to a creative problem rather than a media one. Most South African retail advertising understandably still leans on savings, bulk buying, family practicality and everyday resilience. Less of it reaches for design-conscious consumption, small indulgences, personal reward or aesthetic identity — the territory the most committed premium choosers have just described.
The planning implication
The strategic move is not to build separate journeys for heavily overlapping audiences. It’s to run one journey carrying two layers of persuasion: price clarity, promotional visibility and basket savings for one mindset; quality cues, curated discovery and permission to indulge for the other. Shared infrastructure, differentiated arguments. Brands that continue to plan for premium and value as opposing audiences are planning against a division this data does not support.
Methodology
YouGov Profiles+: Segmentation and media planning tool providing comprehensive consumer insights, with data collected daily. The tool offers powerful capabilities to build and customise detailed portraits of consumer behaviour and preferences.
Population: South African adults aged 18 and over.
Sample sizes vary by measure. Premium preference n=938; lowest-price focus n=937; use of sales, coupons and deals and willingness to pay extra for quality n=5,301. Lifestyle, retail and advertising attitude measures range from n=541 to n=938.
Generational bases: Generation Z n=189; Millennials n=571; Gen X n=147. Baby Boomers excluded due to low base size.
Income bases: under R20,000 household income n=1,576; middle income n=1,892; less disposable income n=310.
Dataset: 19-07-2026
Rakhee Naik is a managing consultant: Insights at KLA.
