3 unexpected reasons Malaysia online shopping will flourish!

Just a little backstory of what has formed the premise for this post, I've just gotten back from a long trip in Australia and it is fascinating to see the differences between economies.  Traveling in Australia has been a fantastic experience and something I probably would have never done on my own accord and owe it to my other half.

Anyways, lets get on with the reasons:

1.  Malaysia has a workforce where many parents both work while raising a child

So, what does having both parents working have to do with online shopping?  When both parents work, little time is spent doing other endeavors, such as going to shopping malls.  But alas people will argue, look at Malaysian shopping malls!  They are world class, always full on the weekends, surely you (me) are wrong!

I don't think I am, and here is why.  If you ever go to the shopping mall on weekdays, it is generally empty.  In Australia, the opposite is true, weekdays, in most shopping centres, you can barely find parking.  But who might you ask is filling up Australian shopping centres?  That's right it is the non-working spouse with their kids.  

Something I noticed, with Australia's high minimum wage structure and ultra expensive child care, one parent usually does not work.  The economics simply don't justify it for the most part.  Childcare in Australia is 2800 AUD per month per kid.  Even with government subsidies at 1500 AUD, it seems not worth it for a lot of families, especially with two kids.

The opposite is true for Malaysia.  Here, child care is much cheaper, from daycare to having maids at home to watch over the kids.  With two parents able to earn so much more, it is a no brainer for both parents to work.  

Therein lies the disadvantage for shopping malls, two working parents is not good for shopping malls which only see massive traffic on weekends and holidays.  So this unusual demographic culture helps put the big competitors of online shopping at bay.  

2. Time  

If you ever go to a shopping mall, it is actually a fairly taxing trip, mentally, physically, eats up your day.  30 minutes spent finding parking, walking to the store you want to buy items, paying, carrying the shopping items, etc.   Yes, eventually people will be put off by the time spent walking up and down the escalators, compared to online browsing over at shoppee or lazada.

3.  Strong earning power of households with two parents

Households with two streams of incomes earn a fair amount of money and while much of it is likely saved or used to pay off necessities of life items, some of it does leak out to other activities.  A two income household lacks time.  Families generally don't want to be hassled when it comes to spending their hard earned time to go shop around for products.  

To people like these, money spent is about how much time it saves, and the quality of items produced.  If quality can be guaranteed, then it solves a lot of issues for time-strapped dual income families.  Online shopping as we know does save time, we just need some kind of quality guarantee.  To some extent, brands do offer some kind of quality assurance, but sometimes its not enough.

Nonetheless, the time saved is great when going online compared to going out.  The earning power of a dual income household trend in Malaysia bodes well for online shopping.