Natalie Myers

Divorced Moms: They’re Overlooked Consumers

September 8th, 2008

While interviewing sources for MarketingSherpa’s two-part special report on Marketing to Moms, I had quite a few bits of information that didn’t “fit.” I can’t resist sharing one from Bridget Brennan, Founder of the Female Factor Corporation.

Bridget says there is a lack of attention being paid to divorced moms. In research she conducted for a new book about the rise of female consumers, Bridget discovered that slightly less than half of marriages end in divorce. Yet few marketers target this demographic.

“There is a whole economy wrapped in divorce,” she says. “And a whole world of different things that happen to families that are divorced.”

Many divorced moms are:

-balancing a new spouse and an ex-spouse

-managing their own children and step-children

-dealing with complex visitation schedules when planning vacation

-managing transportation issues on the weekends

-changing the way they decorate and purchase homes so that all children have a room

The opportunities to reach them are endless. It could be in marketing a service that makes their lives easier, reaching them through a magazine targeted to them, or offering special retail solutions. Bridget suggests creating a “divorce registry” similar to a wedding or baby shower registry at a department store.

Dividing finances is also a major issue. “Regular street-level retail banking could promote this as a specialty,” she says.

Natalie Myers

About Natalie Myers

Natalie Myers writes for MarketingSherpa’s Great Minds and Content Biz newsletters. She covers a broad array of topics for Great Minds, regularly interviewing thought leaders and experienced marketers about innovative or highly successful marketing strategies. For Content Biz she focuses specifically on online subscriptions models, including anything you pay for to read, listen to, watch, rent (as in Software as a Service models), etc.

She writes blog posts about topics relating to her beats, including useful information from interviews that doesn’t make it into an article.

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