Photo: Getty Images; Illustration: Nikko Lencek-Inagaki
Story by Joseph Alexiou
Community Marketing, a gay and lesbian market research firm which conducts studies on the trends of LGBT market trends, released the aptly named the “Lesbian Consumer Index” this year, promptly proclaiming 2008 "The Year of the Lesbian" based on the results.
The largest, most comprehensive study of lesbian consumer habits in history, this index of data and analysis from more than 10,000 U.S. lesbian consumers comes at a time when queer market targeting by corporate America concentrates on gay men almost exclusively, ignoring other groups that were purported to have less economic impact, according to president Tom Roth.
Providing a needed database of information that “distinguishes lesbian preferences and purchasing habits from gay men for the first time ever,” Community Marketing followed up their analysis with an LGBT travel study that also gives, more than ever, detailed information about lesbian-specific tourism: “the most-visited US destination for Lesbian Boomers and Gen-Xers is Las Vegas. Lesbian Seniors are most likely to visit Provincetown, and the Lesbian Gen-Y group prefers San Francisco.”
Ultimately, these studies will allow companies to market to women in the LGTB market more effectively, but they also challenge the widespread trend of targeting only gay men in product marketing, one that ignores an important segment of the LGBT community.
As an added bonus, these consumer indexes also make rather run party fodder, almost like horoscopes!
