the generational targets future concept lab, november 2011

The Generational The Generational

TargetsTargetsFuture Concept Lab, November 2011Future Concept Lab, November 2011






TargetsTargetsFuture Concept Lab, November 2011Future Concept Lab, November 2011Lively KidsLively KidsLively KidsLively Kids

Posh TweensPosh TweensPosh TweensPosh Tweens

Expo TeensExpo TeensExpo TeensExpo Teens

Linker PeopleLinker PeopleLinker PeopleLinker People

Unique SonsUnique SonsUnique SonsUnique Sons

Sense GirlsSense GirlsSense GirlsSense Girls

Mind BuildersMind BuildersMind BuildersMind Builders

Singular WomenSingular WomenSingular WomenSingular Women

Premium Premium SeekersSeekersPremium Premium SeekersSeekers

Normal BreakersNormal BreakersNormal BreakersNormal Breakers

Family ActivistsFamily ActivistsFamily ActivistsFamily ActivistsPleasure Pleasure GrowersGrowersPleasure Pleasure GrowersGrowers


TargetsTargets


TargetsTargets

4

Children, 4-8 years old, Male & Female.

Their alliance with parents is fundamental in terms of the values and consumption choices they develop.

For this group, certain products play a key role in the development of a balanced and happy relationship with the family.

The need for reassuring guides Strong ideas and simple languages Consumption for growth Sharing with peers

Lively Kids

CannesCannes

The Targets

5

Lively KidsIn the life of 4-8 year old children, their partnership with their parents is fundamental. Parents not only transfer to their children precise values and tastes, but also often take the opportunity to create alliances in terms of consumption that serve as a link between the protective realm of the family and that of the outside world, to which these youngsters are continually searching to explore and confront. In this context, some products play a key role in the development of a balanced and happy relationship with their family and encourage a form of sharing that is essential for growth, not only for children, but also for the nucleus itself.

Barcelona

The Targets

6

Lively KidsLively kids play an increasingly important role within family relationships, no longer passive characters, but active and interactive in the realisation of everyday happiness. These little ones become the actors of sharing, no longer simply the recipients of care and attention, but the architects and leaders for successful relationships. Over time and thanks to sharing, they begin to consolidate the construction of a world that is real and social and more adult: parents are still an important reference point (more than friends or brothers and sisters), but thanks to brothers and sisters and friends, the outside world becomes greatly attractive.

MontevideoMontevideo

The Targets

7

Lively KidsAt around eight years old, many kids experience a period of “standby”, waiting for the moment when they will gain access to for example, the telephone or social networks, which represent new worlds and contents in which they can actively participate.

The creation of stories linked to the values of

products/brands can be met with great success, as they

are able to transmit simple content, but express them

in original ways.

CannesCannes

The Targets

8

Lively KidsThe Targets

9

Posh TweensYoungsters, 8-12 years old, Male & Female.

This group satisfies their desire for affiliation and represents the main source of energy for the family.

They are in the initial phases of independence in regards to relationships, aesthetics and thoughts/opinions.

Everyday and accessible themes Affectivity oriented towards coolness Knowledge through experience Room for imagination


The Targets

10

Posh TweensIn Italy, and not only, the fall of the birth rate over the last 20 years has shaped a new category of children - who have often found themselves at the centre of an unprecedented economic and emotional investment - absorbed in a culture of consumption that is deeply structured and articulated. Fashion, accessories and personal objects often become their most appreciated toys. In the definition of the Posh Tweens "aesthetic profile" (Posh = trendy, and Tweens = pre-teens) it is crucial to understand the implicit complicity between the world of mothers - always attentive to fashion and design - who project their own guilt and anxiety by “materialistically” attending to their children – and a world of pre-adolescents who interpret these styles/behaviours as a way to grow-up faster.

Buenos AiresBuenos Aires

The Targets

11

Posh TweensThis social and demographic reality has given rise to many new categories of products and services to involve this young generation in the different aspects of consumption. The Posh Tweens are pre-adolescent lovers of all new things, perhaps the last to follow the traditional logics of the latest fashion trends, or to propose recognisable aesthetics. In this way the group satisfies their desire to belong, which is an important source of energy for the sharing of behaviours and passions with others. Emotional development is in fact enhanced by sharing, even though very soon - growing - these pre-adolescents start to feel like individuals and unique.

Rio de JaneiroRio de Janeiro

The Targets

12

Posh TweensChildren between the ages of 8 and 12 years today have at their availability a huge variety of products and "adult" references in order to live their dream of being “big”. The challenge of the coming future will be that of rendering this projection into the adult world “educational”, proposing behaviours, styles and aesthetics that are not simply the extension of the "fashion victim" logic, but that are able to imagine a creative passage at 360 degrees from the toy to the accessory, from initiatives to projects that provide the chance to share passions and time with adults, be they parents, teachers or grandparents. We must move towards a logic for the younger generations of education and growth, taking inspiration, for example, from the creative workshops of museums, for children and increasingly present in many territorial realities.

MilanMilan

The Targets

13

Posh TweensThe Targets

14

Expo TeensAdolescents, 13-18 years old, Male & Female.

They live in an original mix between gregarious tension and creative exuberance.

They build their identity through extensive consumption that is often frenetic and compulsive.

Bricoleur approachPerformative narcissismHybrid and everyday creativityEmotive hypersensitivity

New YorkNew York

The Targets

Expo Teens

15

Over the past few years, teenagers have started to live an increased rate of independence in terms of consumption choices. The opportunity of easy access to low cost products and use of new forms of media have contributed to the creation of a generation who build their own identity through exploratory learning and extensive consumption. Free access to networks and mobile communication has contributed to reinforcing their need to combine performative narcissism with a need (lived as a right) to express their creative talent.

BerlinBerlin

The Targets

Expo Teens

16

Meeting places correspond to consumption experiences that become important in their lives not so much for the ultimate goal of the purchase, but for the sharing of rules, styles and rituals related to the “dispatching” of the group of friends into the paces (real and virtual) best suited to their exploration experience. The sales points and places for aggregation that work best for this generation are those that communicate through wide exploratory spaces where it is possible to freely experiment with the products and where the cultural stimulation on more the one level, increasingly supports simple goods. The point of view of these young adolescents becomes a stimulating factor for institutions and companies searching for new opportunities to make contact with the “mysterious” teen world.

MilanMilan

The Targets

Expo Teens

17

To speak to the Expo Teens, it is therefore necessary to give them the opportunity to become protagonists in all respects. The global success of social networks, like Facebook and Twitter, is linked to this trend: the teenagers use the networks as a global pool of knowledge and as a sounding board for ones own performances/ideas. The teenagers feel as if they themselves are the main protagonists and enter in harmony with stories (worlds, products) designed ad hoc for them, but that they must take part in, therefore entering into the process of its creation or elaboration.

BeijingBeijing

The Targets

18

Expo TeensThe Targets

19

Linker PeopleYoung adults, 18-30 years old, Male & Female.

They feel at ease in a liquid and complex reality, where the real is enhanced by the virtual.

They freely touch all that they see, in a continuous creative ”cut and paste".

Shared subjectivityTechnological expertiseExploration of the territoryExperiment unexpected connections

BerlinBerlin

The Targets

Linker People

20

Linker People, a group that guides the tastes and attitudes of the new twenty something's. They are characterized by a strong need to rework the world and the surrounding context in a unique and creative way, using technology as an integrated platform, meanwhile always staying in contact with the outside world. They are considered as consumer trendsetters and great experimenters of technological behaviours. A generational nucleus open to any combination, even unexpected, of mediatic and personal experiences, in order to create and launch “shared codes” without ever identifying themselves with one single community.

BeijingBeijing

The Targets

Linker People

21

The Linker People, new multiplayer, multitasking and multimedia subjects. They live in the urban context as if it were a privileged place where they can explore and express themselves. To them, the real and the virtual come together becoming part of a single integrated landscape, in which both the technological horizon and their territorial location create an infinite reservoir of stimuli to propose and collect, made up of stories told through everything that emerges from both the web and the streets.


The Targets

Linker People

22

The story that the Linker makes of his/her own experience is a game of connections that provide an increasingly popular way of living intense, multiple and exploratory experiences. The territory becomes a representation of individual experience, a visual and emotional tale, a metaphor of uniqueness that comes from the symbiosis between the city and those who cross it. This generational nucleus’ approach to the territory and the digital world is nomadic: passing very smoothly from one instrument to another without regard to its specific nature.

MilanMilan

The Targets

23

Linker PeopleThe Targets

24

Unique SonsYoung Men & Women, 25-35 years old.

Refined aesthetes capable of redesigning by implementing the details of new glamour into different fields.

They are looking for personal success, even through highly ego-related consumption.

Alternative luxury The reworking of the testimonial Formal refinement Fashion is central

BeijingBeijing

The Targets

Unique Sons

25

The generation of only children: individualistic, egocentric, narcissistic and consumerists. They are and they feel unique, but are constantly in search of the brothers and sisters that they never had. This is a generational nucleus that still represents the motor for the new consumer societies, from China to the Mediterranean. They are individuals engaged in creative activities and economic performance that constitutes their existential horizon. Poised somewhere between the mythology of capitalism and family values, using the Web to show their importance in the world.

MilanMilan

The Targets

Unique Sons

26

The concept of challenge is important to this target and helps to stimulate constant experimentation. Their desire to try everything and their will to expand or exacerbate the rules imposed by earlier generations, represent the core of many of their unconventional life manifestations. The meaning of luxury for the Unique Sons, contains ideas of exclusivity, excess and exhibition. It is not just about having the best, but flaunting it to show richness. Luxury is therefore, an infringement of the limits imposed by society and rationality. These forms of luxury involve a multiplicity of the senses, and are frequently used as inspiration for new types of products. An element of their profile that puts them at opposite ends of the spectrum from the Linker People.

MilanMilan

The Targets

Unique Sons

27

The meeting point between their values and their demands for modernity stimulates in the unique sons, a revisitation of traditional types of products that are able to support their new daily life dynamics. Maintaining the original qualities, but adapting them to contemporary dimensions, thus creating new opportunities for consumption and product categories. That, which the young male Unique Sons express in their passion for tailoring, and the girls find in their search for classic icons of femininity (flowers, butterflies, high heels, details of romantic inspiration), as well as in formal elegance, strongly rebound within the institutional worlds of fashion and on the streets.

BeijingBeijing

The Targets

28

Unique SonsThe Targets

29

Sense GirlsWomen, 25-40 years old.

At the centre of an ethic and aesthetic revolution based on harmony, gestures, narrative taste and care.

They are in search of a new equilibrium and natural harmony.

Aesthetic sensibility Sensorial experience Sophisticated care Everyday hedonism

CannesCannes

The Targets

Sense Girls

30

The Sense Girls, who define the ideal world of the new thirty something's, are young women characterised by a visibly refined sensoriality, which they emotionally manifest in their daily consumption choices and through original consumption codes. These women, highly sensitive to the outside world and to all that is proposed to them, show a strong awareness of themselves and they know what to look for. Intuitions and perception are complex physiological mechanisms for them, but are at the same time concrete and are the inner richness that passes through the senses of the Sense Girls .

LondonLondon

The Targets

Sense Girls

31

Therefore, their sensorial reality becomes a door to an increasingly fascinating inner world that for this generational nucleus in particular, has transformed the hedonism of the 80’s into a fountain for discovering ones potential through “small daily things”. Singles or couples, they invest a lot of energy into creating a domestic environment that is as close as possible to their ideal one: the house is a microcosm that reflects their inner world. The female world has an ability to build vital experiences and interpretations starting from this intuitive sensibility. The Sense Girls are in search of a new natural equilibrium and harmonies. The products and services requested have to become facilitators in defining new languages and aesthetic codes. For them, what counts is extraordinary care and an artistic touch.

BerlinBerlin

The Targets

Sense Girls

32

This target produces sensorial aesthetics that are very advanced: creating landscapes and atmospheres where visual, aural and tactile elements can intermingle, creating new and magical effects that are central to full body experiences. They are in search of a beauty that is not superficial, but instead is always in harmony with both the inner and outer worlds. In particular, the Sense Girls embody the charm, suggestive and deep, of the primal and original beauty of an object and above all, of a place where the sensorial attractor is nature itself, with its depth and evocation. Therefore, technology and nature become two important dimensions (alternative or complementary) at the basis of the life experience of this generation of women.

New YorkNew York

The Targets

33

Sense GirlsThe Targets

34

Mind BuildersAdult men, 35-50 years old.

An expression of the new intellectual bourgeoisie, in both economically advanced and emerging countries.

In consumption they seek “360 degree” experiences capable of enhancing the value of their personal growth.

Intellectual exploration Cosmopolitan knowledge Neo-nomadism Project sharing

New YorkNew York

The Targets

Mind Builders

35

The search for a personal point of view in individual and collective experiences deeply marked the passage of the millennium. The short circuit between what is considered to be essential and the dynamics of deep reflection on the sense of ones existence, have brought about the birth of a new “philosophy of life”. The Mind Builders are the new existentialists, passionate about reading and cultivating their brains: new cosmopolitan intellectuals and technology experts, who are also proud of their roots and linked to their territory. They are cultivators of languages, in all their versions, and of intercultural exchange. The Mind Builders are therefore, very advanced subjects from the point of view of intellect, culture and economy. Their choices are linked to their strong need for knowledge in all fields.


The Targets

Mind Builders

36

This generational nucleus is strongly attracted to the possibility of contributing to new paths of development in art, science, philosophy and other areas of knowledge. One can talk of true forma mentis, that is linked to the genuine and natural interest in exploring ones own creative and intellectual potential. The status of the Mind Builders is therefore, spontaneous, creative, open to change and linked to constant training of ones own talents and passions. To display these values they use aesthetic and communicative codes that are very refined and not ostentatious. The short circuit between creative energy and critical reflection and the character traits of this group, see the continued birth of new expressive languages.

MilanMilan

The Targets

Mind Builders

37

The keyword for them is Personality, the is brain understood as a complex organ that controls and balances the functions of the human organism. If well “trained” through exercise and intellectual stimuli it allows the construction of a strong personality. To be able to think, always more rapidly and dynamically, is perceived as a superior motor for behaviour and individual and collective choice. This target is strongly attracted to intelligent (smart) objects that include the value of advanced technological research and guarantee exclusive performance. The Mind Builders love to surround themselves with interactive services, demonstrations of advanced technology and aesthetics that also contain a ludic element.

CannesCannes

The Targets

38

Mind BuildersThe Targets

39

Singular WomenAdult women, 35-50 years old.

At the heart of new forms of relationships and sharing between extended families and micro-communities.

They are aware of their ability for original and forward-looking thought in concrete and organizational areas.

Audacious character In search of authentic aesthetics Sharing problems and solutions Project essentiality

MilanMilan

The Targets

Singular Women

40

The Singular Women are increasingly audacious, confident and aware of their strengths, through which they express their feminine uniqueness. In recent years, their emergence has coincided with a weakening of the male identity, even from an aesthetic point of view. Over the past 10 years there has been widespread talk of the single condition, which is considered to be the new socio-demographic of future society. In reality, within this demographic there often emerges a more complex reality of cohabitation and non-institutional unions, moving away from the “isolationist” individualism upon which the single character of the Nineties was constructed and that the media proposed in the transitional years between the second and the third millennium.

New YorkNew York

The Targets

Singular Women

41

In this female world, Sex & The City has probably come to be considered as their media image of reference, but in reality new forms of relations and sharing between extended families and female characters flourish, supporting just a few years later the success of Desperate Housewives. The freedom to be happy with one’s own body, to exude sensuality and therefore, to have a positive relationship with one’s daily life that goes beyond age and the current aesthetic norms in society, is affecting this female world.

Buenos AiresBuenos Aires

The Targets

Singular Women

42

The Singular Women work on the awareness of their abilities and on human burdens and values, supporting new aesthetic applications and simultaneously launching discussions related to work and family management, as well as thoughts and actions that away from focusing on every aspect of daily life, from the home to work, open up to issues that affect the entire society. It is not about competing with men, nor a mere assertion of rights: the Singular Women simply embody a different point of view and association through their life choices and in consumption tout court.

MilanMilan

The Targets

43

Singular WomenThe Targets

44

Normal BreakersMen & Women, 45-60 years old.

In search of new paradigms in daily consumption, alternative for their originality and critical reflection.

They live in the space between the individual and social dimensions.

Critical vision Alternative creativity Shared commitment Ethical aesthetics

San PaoloSan Paolo

The Targets

Normal Breakers

45

The long-time rebels, with a critical and creative vision of the reality in which they live, close in culture to the various alternative movements. For them normality and transgression co-exist and overlap. They are constantly looking for practical life alternatives: for them Naomi Klein and Al Gore, “web gurus” like Anderson and Lessig and Wikileaks Assange, have become points of reference. Also activities such as bartering, the valorisation of the territory and new forms of creativity offer them alternatives. Technology constitutes an indispensable life companion, from file sharing to blogging and the strategies of technological sharing.

MilanMilan

The Targets

New YorkNew York

Normal Breakers

46

The Normal Breakers embody a generation that, for biography and aspirations, tends to look to the integration between the individual and the social. They start out from a more introspective journey, in comparison to the experimental research of the generation of Mind Builders, successfully transforming their creative restlessness and critical energy into the service of an ethical vision of everyday consumption: from culture to free time, from food to design.

The Targets

Normal Breakers

47

The short-circuit between creative energy and critical reflection sees the continuous emergence of new forms of expression, well representing a certain type of research that cuts across various aspects of the project: from that of life, to that which is linked more to everyday behaviours, but that finds its maximum expression in the definition of new paradigms of consumption. Transgression in this way can become part of everyday life, defining a possible shift and evolution in terms of future normality. Hence, the birth of the expression Normal Breakers.

MilanMilan

The Targets

48

Normal BreakersThe Targets

49

Premium SeekersMen & Women, 45-60 years old.

A generational nucleus that, in different countries and in different proportions, has a disposable income and a level of culture that is enough to push them always in the search of excellence.

To them, top of the range is not only of status, but also the expression of an intrinsic value.

Prestigious brands are central Cultural reading of the codes of luxury Vocational consumption, less ostentatious than in

the past Services side-by-side with products, as a new

frontier of excellence

New YorkNew York

The Targets

Premium Seekers

50

Disposable income together with a high level of education bring a part of the world population to become the Social-Economic top of their countries and to assume a strategic economic role, which following the 2008 crisis has not experienced significant downsizing. The Premium Seekers belong to that 10% of households that hold the majority of the wealth of a country (in Italy for example, 45% of the wealth) and that is identified in the concept of prestige and distinction. The lifestyle and consumption patterns of this generational group reflect a constant search for excellence in every field and sector, not in order to show their superiority or status, but rather to enrich their lives with all the best the market can offer. Quality of life takes precedence over social representation.

New YorkNew York

The Targets

MilanMilan

Premium Seekers

51

The Premium Seekers, who also include the new rich of the emerging countries, can be on a whole described as the representative adults of the upper-middle class world society: a generation that knows wellbeing, but no longer aspires in a direct way to classic luxury consumption and, above all following the crisis, lives according to a new depth of values, with significant but not ostentatious consumption that is distinctive, but not "over the top". For this new elite one can speak of “vocational consumption”: attention is placed on the relationship between price-quality and whether substance is lacking; this is also accompanied by a strong cultural base and if product or service has charm. Even the aesthetic codes of luxury have changed, bringing the creative to work on duration and original quality, and the Premium Seekers to appreciate a “deluxe simplicity” made up of few things but the best, unique and iconic, such as design accessories that stand out for their exuberant but not aggressive creativity.

The Targets

Premium Seekers

52

Substance defeats appearance in regards to selection for the Premium Seekers, in fashion but not only. For many subjects belonging to this generational nucleus the values of excellence have transferred from the material world to that of services for the body, care and culture. The women who reach this social status are in constant growth around the globe and in particular in the Asian countries where, for tradition, women and commerce are a consolidated combination. It is also due to this “female footprint” that always more often the world of luxury finds itself alongside the classic symbols of male purchasing power, premium services connected to credit cards, to the membership of exclusive clubs, to holidays and exotic hotels, with the creation of a new grammar of power that includes always more women as well.

New YorkNew York

The Targets

53

Premium SeekersThe Targets

54

Family ActivistsThe generational nucleus that defines a portion of the over 60 year olds.

Active elderly people, aware of their age, but also of the important role they play in their family.

Their strength is seen in the material and organisational support they give in everyday family management.

The construction of a new shared everyday life Consumption centred on the family more than on

themselves Attention to care and protection The importance of networks dedicated to social

solidarity


The Targets

Family Activists

55

The family activists are a growing slice of the senior population who, above all following the global crisis of 2008, are reacquiring their central role within the social and family life, even in countries where their role had been lost. If in Italy the importance of family in the lives of everybody and, in particular of those more elderly, represents the normality, in other countries this is sometimes less obvious. The possibility to re-establish an emotional bond, even if only for economic or organizational needs, brings about unique life experiences that give strength and depth even to consumption behaviours. An example is the constantly growing demand for courses in the use of new technologies by the senior population, a reflection of a desire on their part not to lose contact with the generations of their children and grandchildren.

New YorkNew York

The Targets

Family Activists

56

For the Family Activists the exit from working life means to enter “full time” into the role of grandparents, true and proper “family “supporters”. Their organisational ability, their interest towards the lives of others and their ability to listen to the needs of their children and grandchildren, with a view to family availability, make them interesting references to the world of wider consumption of goods, places and services. The time freed up from work is a large basin to be dedicated to the components of the classic or “extended” family, to the local area, or to an association or social entity with which to feel part of. The time that they have available is precious, because it is qualitatively different from the younger generations: a slow time, without stress or even short-term goals to be achieved, with the potential to become a time of sharing and education for the little ones and their future lives.

New YorkNew York

The Targets

Family Activists

57

Other than being a material resource to the family, the Family Activists become a cultural resource, bearers of a traditional know-how, both practical and of values. Making cookies together or listening to stories from long ago are pastimes shared by grandparents and grandchildren, as much as those of going to the park or playing football. The logic of gift giving and of the free takes the form of emotional exchange: for the Family Activists the possibility of rediscovering their youth through their grandchildren is the greatest reward for their wellbeing, with solid consequences also on their consumption behaviours. Impulse consumption for example is no longer practiced in regards to themselves , but instead strongly returns when addressing the younger generations, with small purchases and gifts that are absolutely "irrational”, leaving parents with the need to simply accept this behaviour.

CannesCannes

The Targets

58

Family ActivistsThe Targets

59

Pleasure GrowersThe cutting-edge over 60 year olds.

The Pleasure Growers do not accept the values and the behaviours typical of the Third Age.

The positioning of this group involves defining a completely new and regenerated «aesthetic»: informal, young and energetic.

(Re) Designing of life, now focused on themselves The search for a new intelligent hedonism and

sensuality Experiential consumption Orientation to adventurous leisure

CannesCannes

The Targets

Pleasure Growers

60

The Pleasure Growers, above all in the Western world, are the boomers who do not accept the values and the behaviours typical of the Third Age and who, beyond this, try to live experiences in line with contemporary values. Daily experimentation, mental exploration and tangible innovation are the key ideals that characterise some basic values of this core generation. The increase in life expectancy determines the “sliding” of this age group and the growing statistic of a generation that regenerates and rediscovers a new position in society, new potential (economic, social and cultural) and lots of “empty moments” in which to exercise them.


The Targets

CannesCannes

Pleasure Growers

61

The courage of those who no longer have to conquer anything is the winning tract of a generation that has lots to offer and still lots to “expect”: they are the generational nucleus that has the clearest idea of its own future. The affirmation of this group involves defining a completely new and regenerated style of consumption: informal, young and energetic. The life experience of the Pleasure Growers today abandons transgression in order to embrace a daily challenge linked to their deep visions and attention to details. For the Pleasure Growers, to give room to authentic emotions means to rid their lives of all that is deemed unnecessary, in the search of inner growth and of an emotional and sensorial vision.

The Targets

Pleasure Growers

62

In other cases it is the the superfluous - like a game – that becomes the main driver of their experience. To simplify means to possess the techniques, the taste and the knowledge to recognize the unnecessary and redundant aspects of existence. The theme of vital sharing constitutes another priority for this group of subjects. If used as an inner discipline, the search for authenticity lets them more clearly define and achieve their objectives by following emotional paths. Among the Pleasure Growers there is a growing awareness that "free space" can allow for the possibility to increase creativity and visionary abilities. In the context of consumption, the importance that this generational group gives to comfort, to playfulness and to the value of the vital experience is directed towards the sectors of tourism, services, free time and domesticity.

MilanMilan

The Targets

63

Pleasure GrowersThe Targets

The Generational Targets

the generational targets future concept lab, november 2011

Documents