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Age against the machine

Entrepreneur Magazine, 4/29/09

Abstract:

There’s a long-held belief in marketing that once consumers reach age 50, they’re dead. That’s because for the past 40 years, businesses trained their budgets on younger adults, ages 18 to 49. When a consumer reached 50, he vaporized--unless, of course, he needed denture cream or incontinence products.

Marketers are finally awakening to the demographic tsunami of the nation’s baby boomers. Born during the post-World War II prosperity from 1946 to 1964, boomers are 76 million strong--comprising 1 in 4 Americans. However, in the past decade, this massive generation became invisible at the rate of 10,000 members per day as they passed the five-decade mark. Now the recession is prompting businesses to rethink marketing.

The fact is boomers spend far too much money to be ignored during tough times. By some estimates, they spend $400 billion...

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