Pink pound

Pink pound is a term describing the purchasing power of the LGBT community in Britain. (Occasionally, the similarly termed "blue pound" is used specifically for lesbians). In the United States, this spending is known as the Pink Dollar.

The British gay market is estimated to be worth up to £6 billion a year. Groups and organisations such as OutRage!, the NUS LGBT Group and the Queer Youth Alliance have been critical of the rapid adoption of goods and services aimed purely at the LGBT community for what they see as negative aspects of larger society, especially commercialism (including treating LGBT people as a distinct market segment or audience), conformism (though it may have different norms to which it pressures members to conform), and ghettoisation.

The Pink Pound is often considered to be responsible for the high sales of specific products seen to be favoured by a large number of gay people, most noticeably music sales of records by gay icons such as Madonna, Kylie Minogue and Cher. A range of large corporations have recently realised the power of the Pink Pound and have begun to directly market their products towards the gay community through advertising in the gay press. This has seen the rise of specialised gay marketing agencies in the US such as Prime Access and Witeck Combs and in Europe groups such as Out Now Consulting. In June 2006 a specialised marketing conference called the Pink Pound Conference was held in London and a similar conference was held in November 2006 by the Market Research Society.

A large market of goods and services for gays has appeared in recent years, including gay wedding services, gay press including radio and television, and domestic services such as builders and plumbers. In 2001 several gay companies produced pink stickers and stuck them onto thousands of Pound Coins which are still in circulation.

However, some research shows, that the purchasing power seems to be overrated. As the British Equalities Review of 2006 shows, young gays and lesbians, who suffer from homophobic attacks in school, are likely to quit their education early. They therefore have lower educational skills. The loss in productivity is estimated at £80 billion a year.

See also

• Gay Ghetto

External links

• "The Pink Pound" at www.bbc.co.uk
• OutRage! Website
• Queer Youth Alliance Website
• The Equalities Review Committee
• Gay Marketing Agency
• The 2006 Pink Pound Conference in UK
• Market Research Society Pink Pound Conference
• Gay Business Association
• GAY to Z Gay Research