Love Island could provide a very lucrative opportunity for brands this summer, as the show’s seventh (fifth in its revived format) season gets underway on Monday 3 June.

According to eBay Advertising, searches for ‘yellow playsuit’ on eBay jumped by 276 per cent during the first episode of last year’s series, compared to a couple of hours before, after host Caroline Flack donned one on-screen. Overall, the entire ‘Clothes, Shoes and Accessories’ category saw searches jump by 26 per cent in the same episode.

In some cases, viewers of the popular dating show aren’t just ‘second screening’ – they’re waiting until an episode has finished to begin browsing for items.  In the hour after the 23 July 2018 edition of the show, searches for ‘pink denim jacket’ and ‘pink denim shorts’ peaked on eBay. This was after viewers had seen Dani Dyer, daughter of Eastenders actor Danny Dyer, sporting a pink double denim combo.

The beauty vertical also seems to gain a lot of attention during episodes of Love Island. eBay witnessed searches for ‘fake tan’ surge 91 per cent during 2018’s premiere, compared to one hour before. During the same episode, searches for teeth whitening jumped 68 per cent while, compared to two hours before, the entire ‘Health and Beauty’ category saw searches up by 18 per cent.

Elsewhere, searches for ‘pull-up bar’ doubled during the first week of the show’s 2018 edition. Those looking for ‘dumbbell’ and yoga mat grew by eight per cent and 19 per cent respectively during the show’s final episode last year, compared to the previous hour.

Love Island also apparently got some people thinking about their holidays. Searches for ‘beach towel’, ‘sun lounger’, and ‘sunglasses grew by 80 per cent, 50 per cent, and 20 per cent respectively, compared to a couple of hours before.

“Popular TV programmes such as Love Island can wield huge influence over shopping habits,” said Mike Klinkhammer, director of advertising sales EU at eBay. “These insights reveal the scale and scope of opportunities for brands – and not only those in the fashion, beauty and fitness categories – to pinpoint audiences likely to be interested in their products and target them with the right messages when they’re most inspired. Armed with rich insights into consumer behaviour and contextual data to find audiences in the shopping mindset, brands have the potential to achieve impressive results and boost their bottom line.”