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| Joachim De Posada |
By Joachim De Posada
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A gold mine ready to be exploited: Baby boomers
In the
United States and Puerto Rico, there are millions of baby boomers that have one
thing on their mind: How to stay young and active.
For any savvy marketer, that should represent
a gold mine ready to mine. Disney World is over 55 years old and it is still
going strong. So are many baby boomers.
Marketers
are starting to notice that baby boomers still have many years of work left in
them and they represent a bigger chunk of the economy than any time in history.
Years ago, being in your forties was assumed
to be your peak earning years but the life expectancy was much lower.
Right now, “a 65 year old man can expect to
live on average to be 88” according to Steven Zaleznick who created a company to teach
boomers how to handle their finances during their retirement years.
Boomers are
right now over a 2 trillion a year market with spending habits that include
their sons and daughters, grandchildren and themselves. They also buy stuff for
their parents since many of their parents, specially their mothers, are still
alive. As many of you know, mine passed away on November 6th.
Some
experts argue that most entrepreneurship is being driven by boomers, more so
than the twenty five to forty five year old population. Boomers and seniors
account for over 47% of all self-employed workers.
If you are a
proactive business person, you should be trying to figure out what kind of
products and services appeal to this market.
Focalyst, a
New York consulting firm found that seven out of ten boomers shop for new and
better products and that nine out of ten are looking for value and are willing
to change from a brand name.
Let’s give
some thought at what industries you could target to earn some of their business.
Right out
of the top of my head, I would say that financial services and insurance
products would be two of the main ones. The boomers need to plan their final
years in such a way that they will not risk their capital and be much more
conservative. Those that have not been prudent enough to have bought insurance
products must investigate to see what type of products they can get at this
stage of their lives.
How about travel services? Don’t you think
that baby boomers are now in a position to enjoy some of their hard earned
money?
When I do
my seminars, I sometimes ask people what their dream is.
In every seminar, the most common answer by
boomers is to travel. Younger people say
to own a home. In your younger years, when you are raising kids and stuff, it
is more difficult to travel but when your kids are grown up, you didn’t eat all
your marshmallows, and you have enough saved to live the good life, travel is a
natural. Some even take out loans to pay for the cruise.
Health care
is also an important industry for baby boomers. It is a fact of life that some
boomers lost their pension when their companies went belly up, other companies
are reducing their pensions and health insurance for retirees is harder to get.
Obama care is now a fact of life and the jury is still out on what kind of an
impact it will have. Some people I talk to, see it as a financial disaster in
the making, others say it is a great idea. We will see.
Another
market that comes to mind is cosmetics. Baby boomers want to eliminate wrinkles
and they want to look young. When you see boomers hanging around with young
women and sometimes marrying them, they are all looking at themselves in the
mirror every day and thinking “how can I look younger”? So, any cosmetic
products that can make people younger, men and women will have a tremendous
market.
A few years
ago, during a book signing, I had the honor of meeting the widow of Pablo
Casals who married the maestro when he was in his eighties and she was barely
twenty. I bet seniors all over the world clapped and rejoiced when they saw one
of their own obtain such a victory although publicly many spoke against it. They
were married for 14 years until he passed away.
Spas and
gyms that cater to older crowds should also do well. Boomers have worked very
hard all their lives and they want to be pampered. If you open one of those
Spas’s and you do it with class and with tender gloves, you will have many
clients.
Will
internet related products and services do well with the boomers? You can bet on
it. The internet has gained tremendous importance in our lives, there is no
doubt about it and lots of boomers are into it.
Many thought that the boomers would not get into technology but time has
proven them wrong. Most don’t love it, some do, but they all know that they
must do it or they will be left behind.
In fact,
many of those porn sites are frequented by older guys that are fantasizing on
their younger days. I am not telling you to open a porn site, ok? I don’t like
that type of business, but techies that can teach boomers how to get into the
internet, how to open legitimate on line businesses, how to repair their
computers, how to use different programs to make them more effective, will do
very well with this market. The web sites that are designed for the boomers
should be easy to navigate, and in large letters so that they can be read.
Funeral
homes should get more customers as the population ages so those that have the
nerve and the stomach, should look into that business. Boomers will also change
the concept of death quite remarkably. Take a look at Eternal Reefs, a cremation
company that will mix your ashes with concrete blocks and convert those blocks into
an artificial reef off the coast of Florida
Nursing homes will also be in demand. In a
study done a few years ago, over fifty percent of Americans said that they
would not take care of their parents in their old age. Some Puerto Ricans are
thinking that way too. Sad but true.
Dogs and
cats are now much more than pets. They are treasured members of a boomers
family. Remember the good old days when dogs slept in dog houses out in the
yard? Not in boomer households! Boomers pets eat, sleep and do things with
their masters. They watch TV, they dress them up, take them to a pet beauty
parlor and they even have cemeteries for pets. Pets are a multi-million dollar
industry.
Boomers
want to save the world. They are ready to help victims of hurricanes, want to
save the whales; they want to feel good by contributing to a cause. They go to
hospitals to volunteer and take care of the sick. The more causes they support,
the better. They are also good for sponsoring events
We have
reviewed a few opportunities here but there are hundreds more. Don’t forget the
baby boomer market and be smart enough to address it.
One word of
advice, if you are a marketer, never call baby boomers “seniors”. That is a bad
word in the baby boomer vocabulary and should be stricken from any marketing
materials directed at boomers.
Health care is an important industry for baby boomers and it is a fact of life that some boomers lost their pension when their companies went belly up, other companies are reducing their pensions and health insurance for retirees is harder to get. Cheap Limo Service Bay Area
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