Marketing consultant: South Carolina benefits from COVID-19 population shifts

Matthew Christian, Aiken Standard, S.C.
·2 min read

Nov. 5—A retail marketing consultant told those attending the Aiken Chamber of Commerce First Friday event that the population shifts that followed the COVID-19 pandemic make it easier to sell the state and Aiken County to retail stores.

Matt Jaeger of Retail Strategies, the city of Aiken's retail marketing consultant, said there were two big effects from the pandemic that would be around for a long time: population shifts and changes to restaurant operations.

"There's a population disbursement that's happening across the country," Jaeger said Friday morning at Newberry Hall. "States like South Carolina and across the Sun Belt are seeing substantial population growth — some of which is unique for the first time in their history."

The Sun Belt is a term used to generally refer to states in the southeastern and southwestern United States. Some definitions extend the Sun Belt as far north as Virginia while others begin at North Carolina. States generally included are South Carolina, Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Texas.

Later in his presentation, Jaeger showed a slide with a picture of a map created by the Census Bureau to illustrate population changes from July 1, 2020, to July 1, 2021.

The map shows that every state in the Sun Belt gained population except for California, New Mexico, Louisiana and Mississippi.

Jaeger said that large metropolitan statistical areas like Charleston, Columbia, Charlotte and Raleigh got a lot of growth that wasn't really expected.

"We don't see that as a trend that's going to change," Jaeger said. "I don't think that that's going to reverse. I don't think there are a lot of people in 2021 and early 2022 that picked up and moved their entire operations and business that are going to go back where they came from."

Jaeger said that this means that there are more opportunities for retailers in those markets. He added that population growth in Aiken has been pretty consistent for several Censuses. Jaeger said that retailers wanted to go where people already reside.

He said that retail sales growth in South Carolina outpaced retail sales growth in North Carolina for 2021.

Jaeger said that restaurants were all turning into Chick-fil-A, meaning they have expanded drive-thru services, pickup options and an app that generates customer loyalty or that they were converting to provide a more formal dining experience.