They are more financially stable and resistant to economic headwinds. Unlike the Gen Z and millennial cohort that brands are more focused on, their youth was defined mostly by strong economic growth while younger generations have come up in a world where middle-class growth has been stagnant, and multiple global crises have occurred, negatively affecting their financial prospects.
As McKinsey & Company’s “The State of Fashion 2025” report suggests, as challenges abound, economically, politically and geopolitically, brands are ‘re-evaluating which consumer cohorts to pursue. While the fashion industry has historically prioritised younger shoppers, the “silver generation” of over-50 customers is growing as a proportion of the overall population and fashion spending. In 2025, brands will benefit from courting these often overlooked customers.”
But why are older consumers overlooked? Besides blatant ageism based on our culture-wide glorification of youth? Fast Company reports that “55% and 54% of those less than 31 years and 31-39 years, respectively, say they ‘enjoy trying new brands or products’. That number drops to 39% for those aged 54-63 and 31% for the 64-74 set. Analyst Dipanjan Chatterjee says it’s possible that marketers see no quick win here among less promiscuous consumers who are unwilling to switch for quick inducements”.
As such: “the most creative, high-production campaigns tend to focus on the youngest consumers, while marketing aimed at older groups follows mindless formulas and plays into time-worn stereotypes about older people as needy and helpless”
Doesn’t quite fit the “luxury” narrative, does it?
But times are changing, and as one recent Bloomberg headline reads: “Luxury brands need to get over their youth fixation to offset Trump’s tariffs,” among other things. In many ways, it’s become more obvious that they just don’t have the luxury to keep undeserving the silver economy. It may be one of their very narrow paths for future growth.
Is this the year of the ‘silver economy’ in luxury fashion?
Long ignored, older consumers may be one of few, narrowing pathways to growth
Image: Ivan Naude
If you were an alien arriving on planet Earth today, taking a look at the media for clues on the human race, you would be forgiven for assuming that we are a society without seniors. It would be thoroughly fair to conclude that humans probably die very young. Those who do live beyond, say, the age of 40 years (or even 35), don’t drive cars, they don’t drink, maybe they don’t leave their homes for anything, and they certainly don’t wear luxury fashion.
That’s because we don’t see a lot of seniors in mainstream advertising, marketing and media. Mostly, what’s ever advertised to them is life insurance and other grave-adjacent services, like the writing of wills or the like.
As an earthling myself, I must say I often find it surprising, and even odd, when someone over 50 seems to have not given in to ageism — internalised and otherwise. It’s almost shocking to see older people participating in normal life because we live in a society that consistently seeks to erase and shame them into a predestined sort of conservatism. It’s as if we want to see as little of them as possible.
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Our obsession with youth makes the likes of the late Iris Apfel, who was known for her flamboyant style and loud personality a complete anomaly. Fashion loves an anomalous figure but it’s also a notoriously elitist and incredibly ageist industry, and that much is obvious in the industry’s approach to marketing and advertising.
But more people are talking about how this needs to change as the world goes through a transition where populations in traditional luxury markets like the US, EU and Japan are growing older. Per Pew Research, quoting the US Census Bureau: “The US population overall is expected to trend older in the coming decades as life expectancies increase and birth rates decline. There are currently roughly 62-million adults aged 65 and older living in the US, accounting for 18% of the population. By 2054, 84-million adults aged 65 and older will make up an estimated 23% of the population.”
In SA, a Business Day report from 2023 states that the over-55 population is worth more than R600bn in annual taxable income. That’s nothing to scoff at. Also, bear in mind that when we are talking about older consumers, this also includes Gen-X’ers, who are younger but don’t quite fit into the millennials cohort. This only extends the size of a population whose buying power benefits from decades of active employment, and/or entrepreneurial pursuits, savings and the like.
They are more financially stable and resistant to economic headwinds. Unlike the Gen Z and millennial cohort that brands are more focused on, their youth was defined mostly by strong economic growth while younger generations have come up in a world where middle-class growth has been stagnant, and multiple global crises have occurred, negatively affecting their financial prospects.
As McKinsey & Company’s “The State of Fashion 2025” report suggests, as challenges abound, economically, politically and geopolitically, brands are ‘re-evaluating which consumer cohorts to pursue. While the fashion industry has historically prioritised younger shoppers, the “silver generation” of over-50 customers is growing as a proportion of the overall population and fashion spending. In 2025, brands will benefit from courting these often overlooked customers.”
But why are older consumers overlooked? Besides blatant ageism based on our culture-wide glorification of youth? Fast Company reports that “55% and 54% of those less than 31 years and 31-39 years, respectively, say they ‘enjoy trying new brands or products’. That number drops to 39% for those aged 54-63 and 31% for the 64-74 set. Analyst Dipanjan Chatterjee says it’s possible that marketers see no quick win here among less promiscuous consumers who are unwilling to switch for quick inducements”.
As such: “the most creative, high-production campaigns tend to focus on the youngest consumers, while marketing aimed at older groups follows mindless formulas and plays into time-worn stereotypes about older people as needy and helpless”
Doesn’t quite fit the “luxury” narrative, does it?
But times are changing, and as one recent Bloomberg headline reads: “Luxury brands need to get over their youth fixation to offset Trump’s tariffs,” among other things. In many ways, it’s become more obvious that they just don’t have the luxury to keep undeserving the silver economy. It may be one of their very narrow paths for future growth.
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