The Age Curve: How to Profit from the Coming Demographic Storm

A Lesson in Retail Math

I was once asked at a presentation how Generation X, being only 11 percent smaller than the Boomer generation, can possibly wipe out a market established by the larger generation that precedes it. It kind of surprised me. I thought everyone knew that a 5 percent drop in market size was disastrous, especially to franchise businesses that for the most part are all the same.

My accountant always told me that a 5 percent after-tax profit was very healthy for a small business. He explained that the last five sales out of 100 we made were the ones where we got to keep all of the money. This was a revelation to me, an epiphany. It was at that point I understood the value of every customer. If I lost only one customer out of ...