Data: How Gen Z is turning retail into an experience economy

For years, retail’s winning formula has been all about speed, convenience and the removal of friction. But now, new research from technology company Snapchat and retail consultancy Portas suggests the next generation of shoppers wants something else.

More than half of Gen Z currently prefer the in-store experience to buying instantly online. For them, memory-making is the next big thing. 

For a decade, retail has run to a simple plan. Make it faster. Make it cheaper. Take the friction out. It worked, and it worked at scale. But growth from subtraction has its limits. A generation of shoppers are now asking for something the plan was not designed to do. Snapchat has dubbed them The Memento Generation.

This is also the title of a new report from Snapchat in collaboration with Portas that takes a close look at how Gen Z is approaching the act of shopping in 2026. The findings are not what you might expect from the first generation of true digital natives.

Yes, they still want speed, but they want it on their own terms. In fact, 83% of Gen Z consumers say how they shop depends entirely on the situation. Sometimes they want efficiency. Sometimes they want to explore, discover and take their time.  

All of this is great, except for many retailers this flexibility could become a problem. Managing two consumer ‘wants’ is considerably more difficult than focusing on one.

A generation investing in the present

To understand why Gen Z shops the way they do, you must understand the world they come from.

Financial insecurity, shrinking social mobility and the sense that milestones like home ownership are out of reach have reshaped how this generation thinks. Rather than deferring enjoyment to a future that feels increasingly unreliable, they’re committing to the present.

The data bears this out. According to Barclays research cited in the report, 47% of UK Gen Z prioritised spending on having a good time and making memories in the last year. While Experian figures say that 60% of Gen Z and millennials would rather spend on life experiences than save for retirement, and 86% admit to exceeding their budget when attending live events.

What does this look like in retail?

This shift shows up on the shop floor in ways that are tough to ignore.  

New YouGov research commissioned by Snapchat reveals that 51% of Gen Z prefer going in-store for the experience over buying something instantly online. For 41%, this experience is most enjoyable when shopping in-store with friends or family, and 61% would happily queue for over 15 minutes for something they really wanted.

Waiting, it turns out, is no longer the friction point retailers have spent so much time removing. For the Memento Generation, it seems the wait is half the fun.

As you may expect, a handful of retailers and brands are already reacting to this shift.  

Health and beauty retailer Superdrug applied this thinking with the UK launch of Australian beauty brand MCoBeauty.

They used a gamified Augmented Reality Lens across Snapchat that turned discovery into play. Users had to tilt their heads to catch ‘falling’ MCoBeauty products in a virtual shopping basket, with messaging about the brand presented alongside their score. The experience lifted brand awareness by nine points among users who engaged with both the Lens and the accompanying ads. 

For spirit brand 818 Tequila, founded by model and reality TV star Kendall Jenner, an experience focused activation at California-based music festival Coachella created a moment Gen Z wanted to remember. A personalised keychain charm bar and co-branded AR photobooth drove strong positive sentiment and 2.6 million earned media views, through over 400+ unique booth sessions and 500+ custom key charms created. This token of proof that ‘they were there’ became valuable currency.

Elsewhere, JD Sports bridged the online and offline journey. During the festive period, the sportswear retailer used Snap Maps’ Promoted Places to make nearby stores visible to Snapchatters as they moved through the platform.

The campaign delivered a 15-point lift in ad recall and a 20% incremental reach. According to the brand’s digital media leadership, the experience was developed to seamlessly integrate marketing into Gen Z’s everyday lives, rather than targeting them with colder advertising methods.

What retailers should take from this

Snapchat’s report poses three important questions:

1. Are you creating experiences worth remembering and sharing?  
2. Are you treating time spent, including dwell, queue and effort, as a feature rather than a problem?
3. Are you giving customers something to actively do? 

And of course, there’s the all-important connection layer. 

Up to 83% of Gen Z send photos or videos of items they are considering to friends or family before buying. The purchase decision is happening in the chat long before it gets to checkout and for brands trying to influence that decision, the chat is now the room they must be in too.