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How to reach China's real big spenders: Gen X

China’s millennials often capture the headlines – and serve as the focus of the advertising campaigns of luxury brands, but the generation born before them, Generation X, are ‘the bread and butter’ of luxury brands. Photo: The Luxury Conversation
China’s millennials often capture the headlines – and serve as the focus of the advertising campaigns of luxury brands, but the generation born before them, Generation X, are ‘the bread and butter’ of luxury brands. Photo: The Luxury Conversation

People born from the mid-1960s to about 1980 may not be as sexy or make the headlines, but they’re a sensible, knowledgeable driver of high-end spending

This op-ed is written by Nick Withycombe

Millennials, yes fine. We get it.

All of us have referenced the Chinese millennial so often that the syllables may have lost all meaning by now, becoming some sort of ritualesque mantra chanted out on a weekly basis at the latest “can’t miss” China expert panel discussion.

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Yet what about Gen X? They matter, too!

They may be a little older, they may not be quite as sleek-sounding and the “Gen X mindset” doesn’t seem quite as sexy (more like slippers and a good book), but logically speaking they are a crucial segment of consumer demographics.

Generation X (which the Pew Research Center defines as those born from 1965 to 1980) – is the generation just before millennials (born from 1981 to 1996).

China’s Gen X, of course, love luxury too. Being born a few years before a game-changing millennial-mindsetter doesn’t change that – and, they may be even more of an important demographic than the millennial. Yes, I said it.

I’ll just insert a disclaimer here: I haven’t sourced data – big or small – or opted to include stats. This is because:

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