They are aged between 21 and 35, they love travelling and spending money but they are reluctant to hold possessions: fundamentally Millennials are “big spenders” but they are different from everybody else and represent a growing market worth 600 billion a year. And everybody is claiming some rights to it! Read it in Italian.
According to Goldman Sachs in the United States people who were born between 1988 and 2000 – a huge group counting over 92 million members – are the most numerous generation ever recorded in the history of the country, outnumbering even the one of the “Baby Boom” of the years 1945-1964 (77 millions) and the one immediately before, the so called Gen X (61 millions). And with their decisions they can radically change the market. Let’s take mobility as an example: they are unwilling to buy cars and they prefer car sharing, a system that is expected to become the standard in the next 25 years making the fact of owning a private vehicle an anomaly. Data tell us that 30% of them is not going to buy a car in the near future; 25% are indifferent vis-à-vis such choice but they would actually buy a car just in case they really needed one; 25% claim it is relevant but not a priority; 5% claim it is not a must and just 15% believe it is actually crucial. Finally 60% (against 52% in 2005) would rather rent one (Millennials coming of age).
With reference to houses, although they rarely own one, when getting older and getting married they may change their mind and seriously impact the real estate market. Not to mention the hi-tech sector. Millennials’s familiarity with technology is already affecting the market, redesigning the sales space: being used to reading data and reviews about products and at comparing prices ( 57% of them does it directly in store ), they buy from brands with the best quality/price ratio.
At the moment, the most pioneering sector which has proven to be able to offer ad hoc solutions to Gen Y members is the one of travels : Millennials in this field are worth over 200 billions/year (Millennial Travel Spending Surpasses $200 Billion Annually). And travel agencies are making use of the Blockchain to take advantage of this.
As claimed by Forbes, <<The decentralized internet and the unchangeable log system make such technology a fundamental tool for creating customized travel services for Millennials>>. Not only: blockchain based operators have been exploiting the generational change and the new demand, by appealing to those young people who think big travel agencies are too corporate-like and profit-oriented to be able to fully satisfy customers expectations. So the new target is to fill the gaps left by the biggest tour operators thus taking away part of their market share. Moreover, Blockchain based solutions perfectly match the Millenials’ willingness to share their travel experiences on social media and to stay loyal to companies offering some kind of rewards for this (Millennial Travel Trends: A Look at the Largest Generations’ Habits).
Cool Cousin for instance, transforms its customers/users in travel agents operating in their hometown so that visitors can ask for advice and customers, “ the cousins”, are pusher to participate thanks to some CUZ tokens offered by the platform which can be turned into prizes given in exchange for suggestions and travelling tips (Can Blockchain Embrace The $200B Millennial Travel Market?). Direct involvment of users, personalization of services, relationships: this is a system that also the rest of the market should copy to be able to get a share of the big cake!
Are Millennials actually revolutionizing the market? Tweet @agostinellialdo.
To find out more about the digital world, read my new book: “People Are Media”
If you liked this post, you may also like “Ecosystem, the key word to survive the market curve ”
