I would say shop culture as well as buyer cultures. A lot of shops in non cycling friendly areas just only keep stock of high margin high end road bikes and MTBs. So it may very well be that the guy in the article photo didn't knew much about bike and was sold an e-MTB because that was what was available and it looked good and unlike those bikes used by grannies and only installed fenders as a second thoughts later when he came back from a commute totally soaked.