GRAPEVINE Texas Andy Ford, chief insight officer for Noble Communications and "WaveMaster" of CultureWaves, told FS/TEC 2008 attendees that demographic evolution is significantly altering the consumer landscape and the ways in which foodservice companies should communicate with consumers.
Ford, whose firm tracks changes in culture and reports on shifts in people's behavior as they occur, said three generations are having more impact on social change than any others. He made the observation during a mini-keynote presentation to FS/TEC goers at the Gaylord Texan Resort and Convention Center in Grapevine.
"[The first] is what is referred to as the Bubble Generation," he said. "These people are 15 to 29 years of age. They have grown up online. There is not a distinction in their lives between [online] and [offline].… Their idea of a conversation moves from real time to offline to e-mail to a phone message to a text [message], seamlessly."
Members of the Bubble Generation, Ford added, "are more interested in an open discussion."
"They are more interested in where to get information they haven't had in the past," he said. "They want to be behind the scenes. The Bubble Generation is prepared to take your brand with them where they go. They're also cool with leaving you out."
But while "giving them a venue may sound like a good idea, transparency is a myth," he said. "We simply cannot not drop the walls to our information. It's not only a bad business strategy, it's too much information."
The second key generation affecting social change, he said, are the Baby Boomers.
"A large number [of them] are deciding to defer [Social Security] payment…and are going to find a second career," Ford said. "They are going to do some things they've never done before. Technology will play a critical role in this."
Ford calls the third generation "the Edge Economy." "These [people] are not defined by age," he said. "They are defined by passion and behavior. The best way to reach out on the [Internet] is not through Eons[.com], not through MySpace[.com], it's through a genderless, ageless portal where information becomes a key element of connecting people across generations, across racial divides, across barriers that exist in the real world. That virtual space is a place where we can bring those people together and allow them to create some of the conversation.
"When you start thinking about Edge Economy and getting Bubble Generation and Boomers together, the greatest opportunity we have to effect social change is through technology."