The Customer Acquisition Generation Gap Redux

Retail marketers have something new to keep them awake at night: the changing face of the American shopper that's well underway. Those changes are fraught with challenges we couldn't have imagined 25 years ago, largely due to the entry of mobile connectivity as a shopping tool.

It's the emergence of mobile that's really widened the gap between millennials and their parents, who are often baby boomers. Overall, boomers still tend to shop brick-and-mortar stores more frequently, especially during the holidays. They're more likely to review the piles of catalogs that show up in the mailbox every day, clip coupons and make purchases in-store.