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

Chapter 21. Case Study: The Death of a Discount Store

It was the eleventh hour, but worth a shot. We secured an appointment with the marketing department at Ames Discount Stores in Rocky Hill, Connecticut. We would review the principal tenets of generational marketing and possibly help them through a spiraling decline in their business.

Before the meeting, we visited a number of their stores to get a lay of the land and develop some talking points. Theirs was a similar format to K-Mart, but it was apparent that the market Ames sought was closer to the working poor and generally the bottom of the retail pecking order. But this wasn’t a valid reason for poor sales. On close inspection, we found the underlying cause of the company’s imminent sinking ...