Senior citizens beginning to 'flex their muscle' in Web economy

RAW STORY
Published: Sunday June 11, 2006

Senior citizens are beginning to 'flex their muscle' on the Web by making online purchases at a higher rate than the general population, according to an article set for Monday's New York Times, RAW STORY has found.

Excerpts from the article written by Bob Tedeschi:

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Any child knows that good things happen when grandparents reach for their wallets. Internet executives are starting to remember the feeling.

Senior citizens, who generally sat out the Internet's first big commercial push, are helping to feed the surging Web economy. Many older online users now have a few years of Internet surfing behind them -- enough to give them enough confidence to click the "buy" button. And because this group has far more disposable cash than any other age group, executives who have not already begun tweaking their strategies to reach them will probably do so soon, online analysts and executives say.

"This group has been kind of overlooked until now," said Heather Dougherty, an analyst with Nielsen/NetRatings, an online consultancy. "But the older boomers are far from newbies at this point. We're not talking about people who are 100 years old and haven't seen a computer."

Dougherty said a recent Nielsen survey found that 27.4 million people age 55 and older bought something online in the last six months, compared with about 26 million a year ago. By contrast, the overall number of adults who bought something online in the last year actually dropped, to 107.4 million from 112 million.

Dougherty said that since last June, senior citizens have bought clothing, shoes, flowers and gifts at a faster rate than the population in general.

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FULL TIMES STORY HERE