Which businesses will benefit from the baby boom?

Britons are having more babies than at anytime since the 1970’s. So which business sectors are gaining from the baby boom?

An interesting article in the Telegraph considers this question, in the light of good sales figures from Mothercare which seem to buck the trend of retail gloom that pervades the newspapers at the moment.

It seems that selling baby-related products and services could be the ideal recession-busting strategy for retailers, service businesses and even manufacturers.

A baby boom adds to the volume of products and services that can be sold. However, there are other factors that mean that baby-related market segments are growing strongly. I’m facsinated by one explanation - parental guilt. The argument seems to be that, since parents are spending less time with their new offspring (both parents work etc), they make up for the lost time by spending more on the child. Not that the child will really notice that.

There is some useful information in the article about market size and growth - for example

“Mintel says sales of babies’ and children’s toiletries reached £303m in 2007, up 22pc since 2002.”

Well worth adding this article to SOW.