LOHAS is an acronym for Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability, a market segment focused on health and fitness, the environment, personal development, sustainable living, and social justice. The consumers attracted to this market have been collectively referred to as Cultural Creatives and represent a sizable group in the U.S. - approximately 16% percent of the adults or 35 million people, are currently considered LOHAS Consumers.
The LOHAS concept is the brainchild of US sociologist Paul Ray and psychologist Sherry Anderson, co-authors of The Cultural Creatives: How 50 Million People are Changing the World. The popular book, first published in 2000, identified a disparate US subculture with common concerns for such issues as the environment, well-being and social justice. The authors aimed to help these so-called “cultural creatives” unite, and in doing so they pegged a consumer demographic ripe for the picking.
If you're reading this, it's likely that you're part of a diverse and growing community of businesses that provide sustainable goods and services to consumers identified as Cultural Creatives in groundbreaking research conducted by sociologist Paul Ray. Ray found a group of educated consumers who make conscientious purchasing and investing decisions based on social and cultural values.
The emergence of the Cultural Creatives as market drivers is unparalleled in U.S. history. Ray's research shows that one in four adult Americans is part of this group—nearly 50 million people. These consumers are the future of your business and also the future of progressive social, environmental and economic change in this country. But their power as a consumer market remains virtually untapped.
The industry that serves these consumers has been identified in a research report by Conscious Wave and given the moniker of Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability, or LOHAS—a market conservatively estimated at $209 billion in the U.S., and growing. Cultural Creatives are the basis of the LOHAS market. LOHAS is not a sexy acronym, but one that we think aptly describes what this movement, and our mission, is all about.
Are You Lohasian?
The new New Age about spiritual ritual, the environment, health, sustainability, and style
It's a Lohasian moment. The term for these 21st-century New Agers derives from an acronym created by marketers on the West Coast—LOHAS, as in Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability. The movie "The Celestine Prophecy", based on the 1993 book that may be the most popular alternative-spirituality book of the last few decades. Next comes the film version of Dan Millman's book "Way of the Peaceful Warrior," about a lost young gymnast who is guided through a mystical transformation by a wise mentor. And Al Gore's movie on global warming, "An Inconvenient Truth," is bound to be popular with the ecologically minded Lohasians.
LOHAS consumers, represent 17 percent of the U.S. population, according to a report released by the Natural Marketing Institute at a LOHAS conference in Santa Monica, Calif. The study said Lohasians are "dedicated to personal and planetary health." Seventy-three percent bought recycled paper goods, and 71 percent bought natural or organic "personal care" products. They pay more to get foods without pesticides and want their cars fuel-efficient.
Among the products and services offered at the conference this year were detoxifying pine oil, organic body lotion, ecofriendly spas, and recycled-cashmere sweaters. A decade ago, one attendee said, the conference vendor room offered only "broccoli and tomatoes." Lohasians shop just as widely for spiritual practices. From Buddhism: meditation and admiration of "nothingness." From Hinduism: yoga, gurus, color and chanting. From paganism: an emphasis on honoring nature. From Asian cultures: feng shui and acupuncture. Lohasians devour heaping doses of Western psychotherapy, plus the ideas of the recovery movement ("one day at a time"). They identify as "spiritual, not religious," and many believe in "synchronicity" or "meaningful coincidences" that might be guided by a spirit world.
Does this sound like someone you know? If you have a yoga mat and "singing bowls," if you chant or do polarity therapy or energy healing, if you consume goji berries or biodynamic organic wines, you just might be a Lohasian.
Source: Newsweek
[more about the LOHAS market]
[lifestylehealthsustainability.com]
The LOHAS concept is the brainchild of US sociologist Paul Ray and psychologist Sherry Anderson, co-authors of The Cultural Creatives: How 50 Million People are Changing the World. The popular book, first published in 2000, identified a disparate US subculture with common concerns for such issues as the environment, well-being and social justice. The authors aimed to help these so-called “cultural creatives” unite, and in doing so they pegged a consumer demographic ripe for the picking.
If you're reading this, it's likely that you're part of a diverse and growing community of businesses that provide sustainable goods and services to consumers identified as Cultural Creatives in groundbreaking research conducted by sociologist Paul Ray. Ray found a group of educated consumers who make conscientious purchasing and investing decisions based on social and cultural values.
The emergence of the Cultural Creatives as market drivers is unparalleled in U.S. history. Ray's research shows that one in four adult Americans is part of this group—nearly 50 million people. These consumers are the future of your business and also the future of progressive social, environmental and economic change in this country. But their power as a consumer market remains virtually untapped.
The industry that serves these consumers has been identified in a research report by Conscious Wave and given the moniker of Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability, or LOHAS—a market conservatively estimated at $209 billion in the U.S., and growing. Cultural Creatives are the basis of the LOHAS market. LOHAS is not a sexy acronym, but one that we think aptly describes what this movement, and our mission, is all about.
Are You Lohasian?
The new New Age about spiritual ritual, the environment, health, sustainability, and style
It's a Lohasian moment. The term for these 21st-century New Agers derives from an acronym created by marketers on the West Coast—LOHAS, as in Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability. The movie "The Celestine Prophecy", based on the 1993 book that may be the most popular alternative-spirituality book of the last few decades. Next comes the film version of Dan Millman's book "Way of the Peaceful Warrior," about a lost young gymnast who is guided through a mystical transformation by a wise mentor. And Al Gore's movie on global warming, "An Inconvenient Truth," is bound to be popular with the ecologically minded Lohasians.
LOHAS consumers, represent 17 percent of the U.S. population, according to a report released by the Natural Marketing Institute at a LOHAS conference in Santa Monica, Calif. The study said Lohasians are "dedicated to personal and planetary health." Seventy-three percent bought recycled paper goods, and 71 percent bought natural or organic "personal care" products. They pay more to get foods without pesticides and want their cars fuel-efficient.
Among the products and services offered at the conference this year were detoxifying pine oil, organic body lotion, ecofriendly spas, and recycled-cashmere sweaters. A decade ago, one attendee said, the conference vendor room offered only "broccoli and tomatoes." Lohasians shop just as widely for spiritual practices. From Buddhism: meditation and admiration of "nothingness." From Hinduism: yoga, gurus, color and chanting. From paganism: an emphasis on honoring nature. From Asian cultures: feng shui and acupuncture. Lohasians devour heaping doses of Western psychotherapy, plus the ideas of the recovery movement ("one day at a time"). They identify as "spiritual, not religious," and many believe in "synchronicity" or "meaningful coincidences" that might be guided by a spirit world.
Does this sound like someone you know? If you have a yoga mat and "singing bowls," if you chant or do polarity therapy or energy healing, if you consume goji berries or biodynamic organic wines, you just might be a Lohasian.
Source: Newsweek
[more about the LOHAS market]
[lifestylehealthsustainability.com]
