Wendy Liebmann

By Steve Anderson, president and chief executive officer of the National Association of Chain Drug Stores.

There has been so much focus on this generation over the last few years: how they were different from every other generation before or after them, how they were going to change retail and shopping for just about every category of business — from CPG to fashion. Much of that is true and, as the second-largest population in the U.S. after Millennials, their impact has certainly been felt. And will be. That said, there are also a lot of myths around them as shoppers.

WSL Strategic Retail has long advised that to see the future of retail, you have to follow the shopper. And today, many of those shoppers are following someone in very small shoes. Generation Alpha, the oldest  members of whom are just now approaching 14, have outsized influence as consumers, in spite of the fact that they do not yet have the spending capacity. Nor do they have the many unmet needs of older shoppers, especially boomers (but that’s for another article).