There’s a reason why market executives are so obsessed with millennials: they are the single largest generation alive today. Analysts at Goldman Sachs estimate that the number is between 90 and 92 million. This presents a huge opportunity for both small and large businesses.
Therefore, it makes sense to tap into this segment of the market by understanding their motivations. Let’s try figuring out what this highly elusive generation really wants when it comes to style and fashion.
Millennials don’t like over-the-top designs
Over the top, quirky designs were a feature of the 1980s era, when movies such as Rambo and Ghostbusters dominated theaters. Since the 1990s, fashion is much simpler. Classic hits such as Pulp Fiction, The Silence of the Lambs and The Shawshank Redemption have redefined fashion to emphasize comfort wear, non itchy clothing labels such as damask or satin woven neck labels, durability and simplicity of clothes with tagless clothing heat seal or super soft printed satin labels.
Millennials are obsessed with social media
In the age of Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest; Social media allows millennials, to keep track of all the latest fashion trends and build their own unique identity around their newly acquired online tastes. Young people are more likely to subscribe to the brands they love and discuss them online. Fashion is social. For a century, the definition of social has been defined. Now it is expanding. The millennial generation doesn’t ask their friends to help them choose what they wear and where to purchase it. They browse fashion blogs and pin photos from Pinterest. What do they wear? The biggest influencer brands and most prominent fashion bloggers have created campaigns that communicate powerful messages
. Gucci’s Instagram content is one example. It is among the most talked about fashion topics online. The trend of DIY is a way for millennials to find a balance between being unique and belonging in the crowd.
They are adamant about taking control of their lives, which can have a negative impact on almost every aspect of our daily life. They want to repair their own computers, air conditioners, and even create their own businesses; create clothing fashion brand.
Crowd platforms such as Kickstarter and Indiegogo allow millennials to become their own bosses: call them entrepreneurs for hire, which befits the slogan ‘for the people, by the people’.
Ignoring popular labels from the past
Millennials are all too aware of what used to be popular with the ‘in-crowd’ from the past generations. Their growing hostility towards the past has led them to move in the opposite direction. We believe this could be the primary reason why young people have opted to hop on board the Dollar Shave Club bandwagon in wanton abandon of more popular brands like Gillette and Harry’s.
Millennials can be identified as a ragtag group of indie entrepreneurs who sometimes, just sometimes, borrow from the past if only to pay homage to it.
Millennials are socially conscious buyers
Millennials care about issues
like the environment, poverty, war and child labor. They are always on the lookout for businesses that support poor communities and create opportunities. It is the ability to be innovative and make a positive difference that millennials are drawn to. “What other contributions does your brand make? “What advocacy organizations is your company a member of?”