Grey pound is there for taking

Published on Sunday 30 January 2005 00:35

THEY are the over-looked generation. The over-60s might be in the twilight of their lives contemplating retirement, but new research shows many older people feel they have fallen off the radar screens of marketing pundits as their spending habits have evolved along with their lifestyles.

Blue-chip companies might expect elderly consumers to live in theirs front rooms puffing on their pipes, but the research reveals some are "bed-hopping, drug-taking party-goers who are more interested in buying plastic surgery and sex toys".

WPP’s HeadlightVision will publish its Engage report this week, painting a very different picture of older consumers than many expect.

The annual survey monitors changing trends among thousands of 50 to 75-year-olds across five nations.

HeadlightVision will present its research to its blue-chip clients next month, showing pensioners see 60 as the age of liberation.

Scotland on Sunday can reveal the report will say: "Being old is now better than being young. Older people have few or no family responsibilities, are emotionally disengaged from work with other dreams to chase, look and feel younger than ever - having been the original aerobics generation, and do not suffer from peer pressure to ‘act their age’.

"They are jealous of the opportunities they have given their own kids and believe they’ve earned the right to do what they want and put their own needs first."

The report says they refuse to look after the grandchildren and are desperate to enjoy new experiences, either learning new skills, taking adventure holidays or doing charity work.

They are even buying new technology such as iPods but do not know how to use them, choosing instead to keep them as badges of sophistication.

The change in spending habits in both products and services has created a huge untapped market for firms which have struggled to get their heads around what the older generation want.

Some of the world’s biggest companies, including Ford and Diageo, are using the Engage findings to tap into this market and capture the ‘grey pound’.

Engage’s Lara Colenso says: "The marketing world is teetering on the brink of a new consumer opportunity."

By 2008, Britain will have 8.5 million ‘empty nesters’ with an annual disposable income of 152bn. There were 19.8 million people aged over 50 in 2002 in Britain - a 24% increase over four decades.

The number is projected to increase 37% by 2031, when there will be 27 million. For the first time ever we now have the over-60s outnumbering the under-16s and they spend 34.8bn on consumer goods, which is set to rise to 46bn by 2008.

Colenso says: "The rejection of traditional values by teen rebel boomers in the 1960s has ultimately led to a society that places individual needs and desires ahead of the ‘common good’ of society.

"Being your own person is now actively encouraged and celebrated in people of all ages, and new social permissions have emerged that allow people to behave how they want rather than how they should. They are more healthy and active than ever before and opportunities for sex, prompted by Viagra, have seen the emergence of new sexual energy among many older consumers."

The survey reports that 59.9% of this baby boomer generation think there is nothing wrong with sex before marriage, with over 30% admitting to having sex outdoors after reaching 50.

Today’s older people were the first generation to smoke dope at festivals in the 1960s and to take cocaine in discos in the 1970s. A small minority have now got into Ecstasy through their own children.

All this has led to a change in outlook on life with more people healthier and wealthier than ever before.

The report says that for some who reach 50 the prospect of facing another 20 to 30 years together is anathema. Retirement can often act as a tipping point at which marriages break down, as people seek out new partners for the final leg of their lives.

Colenso says: "We are seeing a new trend of what is being called ‘sugar mummies’ - older women with sufficient financial independence leaving their long-term partners to seek out younger partners.

"They are finding they can pull younger men because they look younger than their real age, often helped by plastic surgery. But on the flip side, some long-term couples are rediscovering each other when the kids move out. This generation are the post-pill, pre-Aids, Joy of Sex generation."

But what does this mean for big business? Many firms which are run by young executives have little insight into this generation and how they can cater for it. As well as the technology companies, other businesses beginning to benefit include the service industries, which are adapting their marketing campaigns to ensnare the older generation.

In America, older travellers accounted for 31% of all domestic business and leisure trips, with one Californian firm launching an extreme senior traveller service taking 74-year-olds to Afghanistan.

The future seems to lie in the ‘greying’ of marketing campaigns as firms rush to capture the "pension pound".