Marketing Personalities - Monday, July 20, 2009 8:24 - 1 Comment

Disappointed Generation! Spoiled Generation? by Andreas von der Heydt

Written by Andreas von der Heydt

As consumer goods aficionados and professionals we’re not only on this planet to sell goods and services and to make money. That would be too easy and by far too short-sighted. Being in permanent contact and exchange with consumers we’re also having a particular responsibility towards them and society. It’s a relationship of mutual dependency and shared responsibility.

Today e.g. many under 30-year-old, although a high percentage of them are well educated, are lacking decently paid jobs; or are even unemployed. For example in Europe unemployment across the E.U. is for 25-year-old and under with 17% much higher than in the general population with 7.6%. It’s a “disappointed generation” having its ambitions thwarted as the recession has tightened across Europe. A phenomenon so broad that in country after country people have coined shorthand terms to describe a generation frustrated by its plight: Generation 600 in Greece, Jeunes Diplomes in France, Mileurista in Spain, etc. Continue…