GENDER DIFFERENCES AS A TREND IN MILLENNIAL CONSUMER BEHAVIOR AND RESTAURANT MARKETING STRATEGY
Abstract
The vision of the article is to characterize the impact of gender differences on the consumer behavior of millennial restaurant customers as a factor in developing marketing strategies for retaining consumers. The research spectrum of the article covers the characteristics of the millennial generation, issues of gender targeting and consumer behavior of women and men. The research methodology includes clarifying the psychological and behavioral characteristics of millennials and the essence of gender targeting, observations, questionnaires, and expert surveys. Based on the results of longitudinal monitoring (2019–2025), stable patterns of consumer behavior of Ukrainian millennials were verified, which allowed us to trace the transformation of their priorities from status consumption to value-oriented choices. The use of the psychometric DEBQ toolkit provided a quantitative assessment of the dominance of the emotional type of eating among women and external resilience among men, which determines their different motivational vectors in the restaurant sector. By integrating transactional activity data and the results of expert surveys of restaurant business owners, structural changes in the consumer basket were identified, where the category of charitable contributions and donations became a significant component of the generation's expenses. A comparative analysis of global trends and national specifics was conducted, which confirmed the deepening of the "eco-gender gap" and the increase in demand for digital personalization of service through hyper-personalized marketing tools. The model of the millennial consumer portrait proposed by the authors systematizes gender differences according to the parameters of technological flexibility, ethical choice and emotional significance of the restaurant product in conditions of socio-economic turbulence. The results of the article are intended for developing a strategy for the operation of restaurant business establishments and planning a marketing policy for attracting and retaining consumers.
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