Urban consumers

The well-healed urban consumer is a prime target. To engage them effectively, understanding the city environment is crucial. It seems you can’t walk around London at the weekend without falling over some form of brand led or brand-affiliated activity. Indeed experiential marketing in the city is on the up and this is mirrored in urban environments across the world. Little wonder.

Whether labeled ‘urban hustlers’ (Alloy Access), ‘city-sumers’ (Trend Watchers), or ‘new urban middle class’ (McKinsey), well healed and solvent urban consumers are a demographic of great importance. The global urban middle class currently numbers around 2 billion and they are spending $6.9 trillion a year. Their numbers are only set to increase over the coming decades. By 2050, it is estimated that the global urban population will reach 6.3 billion (70% of the population at that time). In short these consumers constitute a prime and growing target for brands.

Understanding the urban mindset

To leverage them effectively – and to get a slice of the spend – understanding that the urban mindset is, to a great extent, influenced by the environment is essential. Living in an urban world means city residents share certain characteristics, attitudes and outlooks. They often have a good deal of love for their city, they live in an environment of sensory overload, they are exposed to an abundance of new experiences, their social interactions are often momentary and they live everyday in a context of great commercial temptation. Successful urban experiential activity rests on a brand understanding this context and so will often play to the strengths of the environment (Ralph Lauren), highlight a sense of city pride (Adidas), offer a form of escapism from the sensory overload (Hendricks), and in a world of abundant experience, provide a truly out of the ordinary, spontaneous one (Volvo).

Those brands that understand the city environment and cater to the needs and wants of the people who live within it are the ones that provide cut-through and effective experiential activity.