Galery

1

The crisis ...
 
Personally, I do not think there is a way out of the crisis in the sense that we will return to the past situation, when we were lent money without any guarantee. You owe for the house you are building, you buy different things and you have a debt to pay 3 or 4 years, but you are granted the next loan. And when your monthly salary vanishes away at some point, everything becomes terribly difficult ... Many people say that the crisis could be managed at the beginning. But we went too far, we became to consume in excess. There was no need to constantly buy so many things. There was no need to have 30 bags and 50 pairs of shoes ...

Didn’t the figures indicate what could happen?
 
People indicated it. They spoke of a feeling that we can not restrain. We walked into the supermarket with a cart and took everything that was on the shelves. We bought things not thinking about the bill at the end. We are careful now. We take the right quantity and pay attention to the expiry date. This exactly led to a 5% decline in buying milk and yogurt. Once the information about the crisis has spread, people started to buy a yogurt at least not to spoil it.

This is certainly a healthier option ...

Yes, it is. This is a healthier option because it makes you live a more balanced life. But what happens in fact? Some sectors support other sectors. For example, a whole commercial chain was supported by cars. When it ‘crashed’, the others ‘crashed’ too. Construction collapsed. And there are 80 construction professions. Everything we can think of collapsed with them - paints, chemicals, cement, iron, telecommunications, furniture, decorations ...

Let’s talk about the mass media. What about the press? Newspapers are losing readers, the Greeks are increasingly informed by the Internet ... Some even predict that the newspaper in its printed form, will even perish ...
 
Newspapers fall gradually. Not only because of the crisis. Let us divide them into daily and weekend editions. I will refer to the daily newspapers. News is updated every minute now. Internet offers you news on the go, at the time when things happen. But following this logic, there wouldn’t be a single newspaper. There are many adults who read newspapers, but there is also a kind of emotional connection. Kiosk newspapers suffer most. Free press appeared which also plays a role. People stop reading little by little and obtain information using faster and more efficient ways. There is something else. Children who are born today can not imagine life without the Internet and without a computer. They learn from the screen, not with pencil and paper. The electronic communication that the younger generations carry is what will affect the newspapers negatively. Particularly important in this case is their relationship with the electronic version and their relationship with the information receiver. A mobile version, for example, could be made containing the Top 10 of the most important news of the day. Then you wont’ have to go to the kiosk to buy a newspaper. The value of the brand should be used. The name itself to build itself again in a different way that relates to today. But this can not be changed in one day. I think there will be generations and types of people who won’t relate with this system. Because we may be online, when chatting on Skype, but we think of off-line.

Yet, children are absolute digital thinkers. They are sitting in front of the screen, whether it's play station, mobile phone or computer, even at the age of 2. I see the connection and it is such that they do everything using a computer. Later on, they talk with their friends, flirt, get information, come into blogs and read or write comments, they get informed practically about everything.

Here are some results of the latest research by Focus Bari. The surveys were made on the basis of an international questionnaire adapted to the Greek reality with interviews online, offline and focus groups.

Originally Greeks cut spending of concern. 49% have cut spending preventively in the period 09/08/2009-03/09/2009. The majority of them because they believed the crisis would intensify, and the other smaller part of them because of money spending remorse. Gradually, the crisis affected everybody’s life and 7 out of 10 people began to spend money more carefully. 47% began to spend saved money to meet their daily needs.

Subsequently, spending was cut back by all. This led to changes in lifestyle, in leisure, habits and in consumption. People began to spend their free time differently. Many young people prefer to meet friends at a café instead at a restaurant. They continue to watch TV and read magazines as before, but have limited visiting cinema, theater, concerts, clubs and bars. They prefer to download movies from the Internet, to chat online, networking, news. Home entertainment now is more important than ever. 51% of Greeks are more likely to prefer to entertain at home (homing) because of the crisis than to go out. 49% admit they spend more time with electronic devices than ever before.