Brave new world: How media consumption and shopping behavior will change in the future

Life will look different in a couple of years. Especially people in urban areas will get used to the advantages of digitalization and the technological development in general.

Wasted time, sitting on the driver seat in your car while spending hours in traffic? A sign of the past. The self-driving car of the future will offer various options to spend time, whether it is a combined shuttle service or an individually ordered robo-car.

Reading messages, chatting and watching media content will be the main activities of the passengers. This means new challenges for producers of content. The classic recipe of 26 or 52 half-hour episodes is a relic of old times. Linear TV broadcasters used to show a new episodes once a week, the format gave them new content for at least six months or even a year.

Today´s users prefer to watch whenever and whatever they want – wherever. They even use the relatively small smartphone display, who had thought this just ten years ago?

It will be most important that a movie or a series can be continued on i.e. the screen display in a robo-car one you entered the vehicle. No log-in or download shall be needed, the smartphone is the digital key and hotspot. This already works at retail: Amazon just opened a grocery store without any cashier desks. The customer´s smartphone is detected at the entrance of the supermarket. More than 100 cameras are detecting any product that is placed into the customer´s shopping bag, payment is done automatically via an Amazon account.

Retail will become more prominent in our future lives. Having more time while commuting will lead into more online shopping.

Local retail can also profit. Imagine your robo-car passing an advertising sign of your local supermarket. By using a smartphone app such as the one developed by German start-up LChoice, you can access the online store and order products directly out of your car. You will even be able to choose whether you pick up the shopping basket on your own (or you might let the self-driving car do this) or if a delivery drone will bring you the things to your home or office.

Tired of paying for the self-driving car bringing you to work? So why not ordering a free ride, sponsored by the show retailer or a sneakers brand? In return of the free ride, you will watch image videos in the vehicle and you can even try the latest shoes. If you like them, buy them online and get them delivered just hours later.

Brave new world? Indeed – and not too far away. But there a still a couple of years left for us to get used to the new way of media consumption and shopping. Let´s start the journey!