Young Consumer Base More Fragmented: Speaker

BURLINGAME, Calif. -- As Baby Boomers become a smaller part of the consuming public, retailers will have to change the way they approach the marketplace to serve a younger demographic that‘s more fragmented with less buying power than the older generation, Lois Huff, senior vice president for TNS Retail Forward, Columbus, Ohio, said here yesterday at “Retail 2015: New Frontiers,” a conference sponsored by her company. “New spenders will be more challenging to reach, and retailers need to learn how to interact with them,” she said. “Part of what retailers must do is to provide more shopper-defined values," Huff said, "that are more narrow in their focus, that provide something unique and personalized and that allow the individual to be more involved in the process.” In addition, consumers will more closely scrutinize the transactions they consider and be more critical about how retailers connect with them, Huff said, “so retailers must choose the right tools to reach out to those consumers.” -- Elliot Zwiebach