Brands Should rethink value in the age of the 100-year life

Edelman’s new Longevity Lab report, The 100-Year Life is Here, argues that people are living longer, spending longer and influencing longer — but brands remain structurally calibrated to youth.

By 2050, the global population aged 60+ will double to 2.1 billion. In the US, half of today’s five-year-olds are expected to live to 100. In Japan, nearly 40 per cent of the population will be over 65 by 2070.

Consumers over 55 control more than 50 per cent of global spending — yet receive less than 10 per cent of marketing investment.

“I turned 64 recently and was promptly offered a stair lift in the mail,” says Jackie Cooper, Edelman’s global chief brand officer and Longevity Lab co-founder. “That single moment captures the industry’s blind spot. Too many brands equate age with limitation. In reality, the 55+ audience represents one of the longest and most powerful commercial windows in modern history. If your strategy assumes consumers peak at 50, you’ve already written off decades of value.”

The rise of ‘middlescence’

At the heart of the report is a reframing of later life. Edelman defines ages 55–75 as “middlescence” — a high-growth life stage marked by reinvention rather than decline.

Seventy per cent of adults aged 50+ plan to travel this year. More than 60 per cent regularly engage in brain health activities. Seventy-six per cent are interested in fitness and mobility — a higher proportion than those under 55.

Emotional wellbeing peaks in people’s 60s and 70s, quietly dismantling the industry’s long-standing belief that youth is the pinnacle of aspiration.

At 55, a consumer could have 50 years ahead with a brand — longer than the entire adult lifespan of a Millennial today. Yet growth models and lifetime value calculations remain anchored to the assumption that customer value peaks at midlife. In a 100-year life economy, that assumption is expensive.

The cost of getting it wrong

Courtney Miller, executive vice president and head of strategy at Edelman and co-author of the report, is blunt about the economic stakes. “The economic implications are immediate,” she says. “In the US, under-engaging and under-employing people over 50 costs up to $850bn in GDP annually. In Europe, the ‘silver economy’ represents a €5.7tn market growing at roughly 5 per cent per year. Overlooking the 55+ audience is not a niche oversight — it is a material growth decision.”

Brands risk forfeiting more than 50 per cent of future consumption growth in developed markets by under-serving older consumers. There are reputational risks too.

Only 15 per cent of brand imagery includes adults over 50, despite them representing 46 per cent of the population. Exclusion erodes trust. Stereotypes weaken loyalty. As scrutiny around ageism intensifies, reputational exposure compounds.

Some brands are already shifting the narrative.

Edelman’s work for Dove, 'Beauty Never Gets Old', spotlighted women aged 60 and above as the faces of beauty, challenging industry norms and reframing ageing as confidence rather than decline.

Burberry cast Olivia Colman as the face of the brand, positioning an older woman as a symbol of modern luxury. Moncler’s 'Warmer Together' campaign placed Al Pacino and Robert De Niro — both in their eighties — at the centre of a global luxury launch.

These are not nostalgic gestures. They are commercial signals. They reflect an understanding that longevity is not a niche — it is a market reality.Meanwhile, middlescents are brands’ loyalty engine.

Adults over 55 are approximately 10 percentage points more likely than average consumers to remain loyal to everyday brands — and that loyalty compounds over decades. In the UK, 82 per cent of shoppers over 55 stayed with the same apparel brands and retailers in the past year.

Digitally fluent, culturally influential

The report also dismantles the caricature of digital disengagement.

Eighty-nine per cent of adults aged 50+ have used social media in the past three months. Gamers aged 50+ play an average of 12 hours per week and are projected to drive up to $2.5bn in biannual spending on gaming content and hardware.

This cohort is active across social and streaming platforms and influential across categories including health, finance, travel, food and beauty.

They sit at the centre of multigenerational networks, shaping purchasing decisions both upstream and downstream. Longer lives widen not only the commercial window, but the advocacy and employee engagement windows too.

A 100-year brand strategy

The report’s conclusion is straightforward: a 100-year life demands a 100-year brand strategy.

That means widening brand windows beyond quarterly cycles. Designing for reinvention and second acts. Shifting from measuring what customers are worth to the business to asking what the business is worth to their life.

The 100-year life is already reshaping spending power and cultural influence. The question is whether brands are prepared to build relationships that last half a century — or continue optimising for a customer they quietly assume has already peaked.