SINGLE WOMEN ARE THE NEXT GENERATON OF SUPERWEALTH
Young women are choosing themselves over marriage and babies. They have financial freedom, taste, time and autonomy. The smartest brands and businesses will respond.
A seismic shift is occurring in heterosexual relationships. Chanté Joseph’s viral Vogue story, Is It Embarrassing to Have a Boyfriend Now?, captured and defined the zeitgeist by pinpointing exactly the changing sentiments around heteronormative relationships. The fact is this: women globally are choosing themselves. This isn’t an ephemeral phase as a result of women collectively being fatigued with their dating experiences. This is a mind, body and soul transcendence, where, to put it bluntly, single women have realised that they have outgrown single men.
The smartest brands will not only pay attention, they’ll respond. Why? Women are in their era of energetic dominance. Women are professionally successful, they’re financially autonomous, they’re athletically capable and, crucially, they’re thriving on independence. These are stereotypically ‘masculine’ traits. Combine this with her innate femininity: she is also a high effort person with a preference for tactility, meaning, self-love and expression. She wants to find ways to elevate and enhance the life that she has built, and chosen. It’s both a demographic and a mindset—it’s a philosophy to live by. Single women are about to become a world superpower that has the security, and inclination, to spend.
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There is a new archetype to get to grips with: the single female breadwinner.
She is the head of her household. She is the leader and the decision maker, not only over her investments as a sole-income earner but over her life; child-free by choice, she has high agency, high discretionary spend potential, time sovereignty and a low need to compromise. She also has fewer obligations than her nuclear counterpart: the primary recipient of her time, energy and spend is herself. Brands of all kinds are set to benefit from this influx of women’s superwealth; her loyalty potential is untapped, and her economic power is undeniable. The time to start speaking directly to this customer is now.
Jewellery brands were among the first to foresee the rise of this new archetype. From around 2019, London-based Jessica McCormack and brands such as Tiffany & Co began speaking about jewellery in a way where young, professional women felt seen. Diamonds were typically a gift that was given to women by a man to signify a life milestone, like an engagement, or a wedding. Instead, these jewellers posited that diamonds were a rarity that could be self-acquired. It reframed the historic narrative and societal expectations around jewellery entirely. Women no longer needed to wait for a man to bestow sparkles unto them. They no longer needed permission or to be chosen by another person to earn themselves a diamond. They could just buy it for themselves.
“Women are in their era of energetic dominance. How can you fuel the notion of a life beyond her wildest dreams?”
It was a rallying cry for women to start celebrating their own achievements. It was a call-to-action for women to start aspirationally using their purchasing power for meaningful, big-ticket items for themselves. Reward yourself, it said—for a promotion, for a pay rise, for a birthday, to acknowledge their hard work, or simply because they wanted it. Women, they proffered, don’t need a reason to shine. By being, they just do. It chimes with the zeitgeist about how single women today are feeling about singlehood. It’s main character energy, and then some.
This was an evolution of the accessibility message, where diamonds were touted for everyday; jewellers such as Repossi and McCormack created wearable sparkles that were intended to be worn casually with white T-shirts. It’s a fitting message for now for all sectors: elevating the everyday is now a marketing message and a lifestyle choice. Apply it to everything from a £5 daily matcha latte to a £28 hot Pilates class or by taking yourself off on a solo safari—what matters is the belief in one’s own ability to exercise good judgement over one’s own spend. Autonomy is everything to this archetype.
That 2019 shift in language and marketing messaging was a smart foresight. For the jewellery industry at large, the change in consumer spend will arguably become a lifeline given sales of engagement and wedding rings are likely to drop. Marriage has slid down the chart of aspirational life goals, and besides, millennial couples are hitting these milestones later, if at all. Had jewellery brands not started courting independent women as consumers to rewrite the purchasing playbook, would diamond houses today lose their relevance? It gives pause for thought.
Today, the lesson for brands is this: start engaging with this customer now. Learn who she is and what she wants. How can your brand or product amplify her carefully built existence? How can you fuel the notion of a life beyond her wildest dreams? By truly getting to know her. Learn her behaviours, her lifestyle and her, crucially, her mindset; understand where she derives meaning. This archetype is incredibly learned and self-assured. Authenticity is key.
“Single women have realised that they have outgrown single men.”
Businesses also need to start factoring in this transformative shift in societal norms when it comes to hiring. Whether coupled or not, many young women are choosing to live a life that is child-free; a 2024 survey by Pew Research found 64 percent of women under 50 reported they didn’t have children because they didn’t want them—only 50 percent of men in this demographic said they didn’t want kids. The true number will have risen since, as sentiments continue to shift. This is significant for the future of the workplace. “Six-in-ten [women under 50] say not having kids has made it easier for them to be successful in their job or career and to have an active social life,” reported the study. Businesses, take note. Women who are child-free by choice often opt for a life where career is paramount.
And yet, culturally, there remains an expectation and therefore an embedded attitude whereby women of a fertile age could be considered, by employers, as “not pregnant…yet.” Rarely is this admitted, but it is a truth that remains: women in their 20s, 30s and 40s carry the weight of the nuclear family.
The fact remains that women who do choose to start a family are still finding themselves frozen out of career progression; women are still getting made redundant while on maternity leave. Is the single female breadwinner inheriting this limitation, based on a narrative that has been bestowed onto her? How many single, child-free women are being overlooked because their boss or their HR department envisages they “might” end up having a child? Despite it not being in her life plan.
The glass ceiling still exists. Big businesses like Google and Meta may offer employees to freeze their eggs as a professional incentive, but it still predicates a woman’s career ambitions against the backdrop of fertility. There is untapped talent here; there are women who are not being considered seriously (whether as consumers or employees or business leaders looking for investment) because of an invisible, yet potently ingrained, societal expectation that she will become distracted by family. It’s also well-known that workplace culture in Western countries can skew unfairly towards child-free employees; those without families are deemed to have less personal commitments, and are often expected to work late, go on undesired, last-minute work trips and they are less likely to be granted flexible working hours, according to a story published by Forbes.
There is a critical need to understand and incorporate a new narrative for women—one which is respectful, inclusive and understanding. Some women are child-free by choice, and others are not. Not all roads lead to motherhood, and personal matters should not predicate a woman’s lived experience in the workplace. The most intuitive hiring departments will be quick to adopt this view. Build a business and a hiring department that is based on the belief that all staff have the potential to become legacy staff. Hire with meaning. Don’t limit your staff’s growth with skewed, societally-imposed expectations.
Businesses and consumer brands need to lead with the view that the single female breadwinner has uncapped longevity.
The single female breadwinner who chooses to be child-free has the freedom of spontaneity, of indulgence, of rest and recuperation and reward as well as commitment and intentionality. She has the capacity and the diligence to make what she deems the smart choice versus the easiest choice. Your businesses, brands and products will have to be a cut-above to bypass her discernment.
The single female breadwinner is growing every single day. She’s self-reflecting, she’s learning and she’s evolving her perspective. She’s living a life that is rich with experiences, and she is looking to be enriched by what and who she surrounds herself with. The SFB is a philosophy and a practice; it’s also an invitation to women who are on-paper ‘nuclear’ to move through the world her way. To stand tall with self-assured authority over your own intentionality. Don’t miss out on her power because you underestimated her potential, or failed to understand what matters to her.
By Grace Cook, Nicola Strange and Ben Gallagher. image credits: Pinterest, DTS. Images are used for editorial purposes only; all rights belong to their respective owners.