Piper Jaffray Completes 12th Biannual 'Taking Stock With Teens' National Study of Teen Shopping Behavior and Brand Preferences

MINNEAPOLIS, Oct. 5  /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Piper Jaffray & Co. Senior Retail Analyst Jeff Klinefelter and a collaborative team of other senior research analysts recently released the results of the 12th biannual proprietary research survey on teen spending habits and retail brand perceptions, titled "Taking Stock With Teens." Klinefelter and team conducted mall research field trips in 11 cities in the United States and Canada surveying approximately 1,000 students. Piper Jaffray also partnered with the national DECA organization for the fourth time resulting in approximately 3,000 additional completed teen surveys.

Overall, the survey shows that total fashion spending by students is beginning to moderate with total spending declining among young men by 11 percent from the spring tour and 14 percent year over year. Spending for young women was down five percent since spring and 12 percent year over year. Teenage consumers do, however, continue to spend a significant amount of money on the fashion category, which represents 41 percent of the total teen budget for the fall season, versus 43 percent in the spring 2006 season.

Klinefelter and team surveyed teens on their favorite places to shop and their spending habits. Based on their responses, Hollister, a concept of Abercrombie & Fitch, took the top spot as the most frequent overall destination for the fourth consecutive survey followed by West Coast Brands, which includes Pacific Sunwear of California, Volcom, Hurley, Quiksilver, Billabong, Sun Diego, Roxy and Element. In third place is Abercrombie & Fitch followed by American Eagle in fourth and Urban Outfitters in fifth place.

The students were also surveyed on video games. In total, 81 percent of teens own at least one video game platform and 61 percent answered that they are occasional game players, playing at least monthly. Additionally, 49 percent of teen households indicated they currently own or intend to purchase a next-generation console. Students were also asked about their buying habits of MP3 players and online music. Of those students who own a MP3 player, 79 percent indicated that they also own some form of iPod, which is up from 77 percent in spring 2006. For online music services, 91 percent of students indicated that they use iTunes, up from 71 percent in spring 2006. Additionally, interest in MP3 phones increased to 74 percent from 70 percent in the spring 2006 survey.

New to the survey this fall were specific questions about channel preference in the beauty categories of skin care and cosmetics. Overall, teens shop at discount stores and drug stores to purchase skin-care items and specialty retail stores for cosmetics. MAC was the top-ranked preferred cosmetics brand among teen respondents this fall for the second consecutive survey.

Parents were also surveyed in a separate study. Parent spending on apparel for themselves and their teen was down 13 percent year over year. Parents in the survey indicated that they would be spending approximately 12 percent less year over year on their teens following a year of 30 percent-plus increases.

Parents also responded to their buying habits of flat-panel TVs and home theater systems. The intent to purchase a flat-panel TV within the next six months increased to 34 percent from 15 percent in the spring of 2006 and 11 percent year over year.

About Piper Jaffray

Piper Jaffray Companies is a leading, international middle market investment bank and institutional securities firm, serving the needs of middle market corporations, private equity groups, public entities, nonprofit clients and institutional investors. Founded in 1895, Piper Jaffray provides a comprehensive set of products and services, including equity and debt capital markets products; public finance services; mergers and acquisitions advisory services; high-yield and structured products; institutional equity and fixed- income sales and trading; and equity and high-yield research. With headquarters in Minneapolis, Piper Jaffray has 24 offices across the United States and international locations in London, Madrid and Shanghai.  Piper Jaffray & Co. is the firm's principal operating subsidiary.  (NYSE:PJC) ( http://www.piperjaffray.com/ )

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