So, shopping has been crazy for families this year, trying to stay on top of having enough hand sanitizer and snacks. Back to School season was so strange that we wrote three blogs about it—and it all started with Amazon Prime Days being postponed indefinitely in July.

Let’s all take a deep breath together (seriously…one, two, three, in, and exhale), and buckle up for holiday shopping for families in the age of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Join us for an engaging Back to School discussion with parents from around the country.  We will explore this year’s mid-pandemic new “Back to School” experiences—including pivots and course changes families have been making since the first day of school.

At C+R Research, our YouthBeat^® and CultureBeat teams collaborate closely to understand multicultural youth and families’ circumstances and needs. Hispanics make up the fastest-growing market segment in the United States.* As such, to coincide with Hispanic Heritage Month, we pause to celebrate the vibrance of Hispanic teens with a new eBook.  

At C+R Research, our YouthBeat^® and CultureBeat teams collaborate closely to understand multicultural youth and families’ circumstances and needs. Hispanics make up the fastest-growing market segment in the United States.* As such, to coincide with Hispanic Heritage Month, we pause to celebrate the vibrance of Hispanic teens with a new eBook.  

Our YouthBeat® panelists have had a lot to say about going to school this fall through our Say What? Video Journals. 

Not surprisingly, health is the top concern this year for the parents and educators who have children and students in primary school in the U.S. It used to be that standard immunizations and the playground delivery of “Circle, circle, dot, dot, now you’ve got your Cootie shot!” was enough to protect kids from most sicknesses beyond the common cold and the occasional stomach flu.

We like to wax nostalgic about what Back to School shopping used to look like. Remember the Staples commercial from just a few years ago? Or in more recent years, the First Day of School social media posts with sad kids and ecstatic, mimosa-wielding parents waiting for the bus? Nobody’s laughing this year. 

At our parent company, C+R Research, we’ve been proactive in gauging consumer perspectives around the pandemic through our Consumer Connections series, The COVID-19 Chronicles. As part of this effort, our YouthBeat^® team reached out to parents and youth with an add-on to our semiannual tracking survey. What we found was that compared to the general population, parents are particularly attuned to the stresses of the pandemic.