Childless By Choice - childless couples an emerging demographic - Statistical Data Included

American Demographics, Nov 1, 2001

However, couples without children say companies - including financial services, insurance, charitable groups, restaurants, and travel and leisure companies - fail to recognize their spending power. When Julie Revell Benjamin, a 40-year-old technology writer from Duvall, Wash., plans a vacation, she doesn't bother consulting a travel agent. Instead, she seeks recommendations from others like herself: childless couples who balk at the "family style" offerings of most hotels. Says Revell Benjamin: "We swap information on hotels that cater to us, and we avoid the ones that don't. We're a huge, untapped market. People think that because we don't have children, we're not buying things. It's just not true. We're buying different things: cruises, vacations, cars. There's a whole profile of child-free couples. We tend to be environmentally motivated, we enjoy the good life, we spend more on entertainment, home remodeling and landscaping, we go out to restaurants more frequently."

Couples such as the Benjamins complain that companies don't consider their preferences when they make sales pitches. "I saw an ad for a pregnancy test where the woman is happy to find out she's not pregnant," says Shannon Peterson, a married 27-year-old from Sunnyvale, Calif. "The commercial could have ended there, but of course, she [the actress] has to add, 'But I want to get pregnant someday.' " Peterson, who had a tubal ligation in January, offers another example. "One ad for Rag shows this new microwaveable pasta being eaten by kids, and the voice says, 'For your family!' I said to my husband, 'Why aren't they marketing to me? I work, I'm on the go, I can't cook. I would eat something like that.' "

Says Karen Smith: "All the investment ads talk about education IRAs and saving for college and trusts for children. But people who don't have kids want to know how to give to charity and how to retire. Magazines always give advice on saving for kids. But what if you don't have kids? How do you structure your savings then? I would like to see just one ad thrown in the mix that addresses our needs."

There are some exceptions. Revell Benjamin responds to ads that show couples without children as "carefree and fun-loving" rather than "scary, mean killjoys." "There was an ad for Impala where a husband is driving and the wife has her head out the window," she recalls. "The tag line was, 'Did you hear the one about the couple who test drove the Impala and never came back?' "

In fact, the Dallas-based restaurant and games/entertainment chain, Dave and Buster's, has built its franchise of 28 outlets nationwide around strict policies meant to deter families with small children. As a result, childless couples cite Dave and Buster's as an attractive venue. "Our goal was to cater to adults, and we try to project 'adult establishment' in our marketing efforts," explains co-founder and co-CEO Dave Corriveau. "Normally when you think of games, you think of teens taking over, but we wanted to preserve a place for the over-21 crowd. That's why we have some pretty hard and fast rules about children."