“Those aged over 55 accounts (sic) for 42% of all adults and this market possesses 80% of all private wealth.” This quote was recently attributed to the managing director of a bathroom firm by one of the kitchen and bathroom magazines. Presumably a great percentage of that 80% is concentrated in the hands of a few rather than evenly distributed across the whole group, but if even partly true, we should all be aiming squarely at the over 55s when working out our target customer base, shouldn’t we?
Well yes and no, it really depends on where your business is situated, what the competition is doing and various other factors. Whether you have a retail store or sell to other businesses, the one thing that is certain is that it is critical to work out who you want to sell to, what products will appeal to them and how much you should charge to allow you to achieve a sale whilst making a profit: something that has become an increasingly difficult balancing act in the current economy. If your store is on a trading estate next to a large area of low cost housing, trying to target ABs over 55 is probably not going to work, but appealing to young couples who are doing up their homes and want reasonably priced and fashionable products may well do.
Find a USP – something that makes you different from your competitors and will appeal to your chosen customer, and promote it.
Develop a look and stick with it – it’s worth spending a few hundred pounds on working out what sort of look will appeal to your targets and getting a proper logo that suits the business and then making sure that you don’t spoil that by cramming the store with hundreds of tatty hand written signs, torn boxes etc. Unless of course you have a supply of seconds and end of lines, your chosen demographic is D/E and you want to give the impression of bargain basement rock bottom prices.
Whatever you decide sanity check it every so often, make sure that the people you thought you were selling to, are actually your customers and adjust accordingly.
Me? I’m off to open a business selling walk-in showers and easy access baths – apparently they’re the next big thing as we all get older and unable to climb in and out of the bath as easily, and they say that the grey pound is the one to aim for....
