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The Future Is Old

You are, I’m afraid to say, getting older.

That person sitting next to you is.

I am.

Even Gen Z, with every passing second, are ageing out of their asymmetrical haircuts and vintage jeans.

Age is the temporal Terminator – it absolutely will not stop, however much we might wish otherwise.

And, lest we forget, humanity is also getting collectively older.

The balance between young and old is decisively shifting into the grey as birth rates steadily decline and lives are lived in better health, and for longer. Not just in ‘western’ geographies and ‘developed’ economies, but everywhere.

The future is old, and it’s getting older.

Which is already creating seismic economic, social and cultural shifts and challenges.

A fact we can choose to embrace.

Or something we can choose to ignore the hell out of.

Sadly, marketing is firmly in the denial camp.

Much has been written about the industry’s unhealthy fetishisation of youth, about the lack of representation of older people, and about ageism in the marketing community’s makeup and output.

But it’s increasingly looking like a cultural and commercial suicide-cult rather than an understandable, if myopic, oversight.

This is Junk Thinking at its very worst, the ultimate in trash demographics.

And almost all of us have been guilty of it, at some point or another.

But wait! I hear you say. Youth are the future! They’re the buyers our brand will need in years to come! What we sow today, we reap tomorrow! They’re the beating heart of the cutting edge of culture’s event horizon!

Well, yes, this may be true.

But it’s equally true, underlined by a raft of surveys over the last few years, that people over the age of 50 account for over half of all consumer spending (including self-defined ‘youth’ categories) and three quarters of all wealth – but well under 10% of marketing investment.

And, should anyone need reminding, we’re not talking about the demographic Walking Dead here, barely existing in a physical and cultural cul-de-sac.

These are people who like finding new music (yes, often on TikTok), taking drugs (no, not Beta Blockers), playing sport, having sex and are as busy ‘creating culture’ – and switching out brands that don’t speak to them – as anyone in their 20’s.

They’re also going to be alive and vigorously buying long after the 39 month tenure of the average 52 year-old CMO is up.

And I can count on the fingers of one (inextricably ageing) hand the number of marketing briefs I’ve seen in the last 20 years that have acknowledged the truth about age, and proposed doing something about it.

That’s not to say that we should all suddenly ignore the young for the old.

But the brands that embrace what all the data’s telling them, rather than driving a truck through it, are the ones that will age most gracefully, and profitably.

Because, even for the young, the future is old – and getting older.

What do you think the answer to this kind of demographic Junk Thinking is?