Retailers could become health-testing hubs as buying shifts to consumer systems

Mintel’s Global Predictions 2027 defines a consumer system as a set of products, services, technologies and behaviours that people combine to reach an outcome, such as better sleep or more energy. As purchases move from individual items to these broader systems, retailers could take on a bigger role than product access and recommendations.

Optima Wellness Pharmacy in South Korea illustrates the shift with in-store AI-led skin health analysis. The service places testing and interpretation alongside product sales, showing how a retailer can support a health outcome rather than only sell a single item.

In household care, influence may move toward the retailers, platforms and appliance makers that identify a need and own the relationship with the household. That would give those players a stronger position in how households manage everyday needs.

Mintel warns that brands focused only on product performance risk becoming interchangeable components within systems controlled by others. Retailers that become community hubs for monitoring, testing and interpretation could therefore hold more of the consumer relationship.