Teenagers are a coveted group for marketers. They’re brand-conscious and they’re at an age where they’re starting to make some life-long choices about brands and what they prefer. Of course, teenagers are a fickle bunch too, which makes them challenging and fun to try to reach.
Of course, this is a group that young adult authors are absolutely trying to connect with, so I thought I’d track down some broad market research on what teens like and don’t like as a way to better understand who may be reading these books.
This is the first in a series of three posts about the teen market. For these posts I’m relying on research from “The Cassandra Report” from The Intelligence Group, which tracks the interests of young consumers and trendsetters.

This post looks at fashion and retail preferences, while Wednesday’s post will cover consumer products and Thursday’s will look at Web trends.

Fashion and Retail – Here are some of the brands capturing the hearts and minds of young consumers…

  • Fashion Trends – Architectural Fashion, Distill, The Michelle Obama Effect, Product Reconstruction, Social Experience T-Shirts, Tried & True, Mimosa 2009.
  • Smart Marketing: Cheap Peace By Cheap Monday, DVF Comic Book, Armani Aromas Projects.
  • Favorite Jeans Brand – Levi’s is the top favorite jean for both trendsetters and mainstream
  • Favorite Clothing Brand – American Apparel is the top favorite clothing for trendsetters while American Eagle is the top for mainstream
  • Favorite Sneaker Brand – Nike is the top favorite sneaker for both trendsetters and mainstream
  • Ones To Watch: Fashion – Velvet Leaf, Propr, Shipley & Halmos, Jack Spade, Sophomore, Corpus, Adidas SLVR, Samantha Pleet, Rag & Bone.
  • Retail Trend – TextBuyIt, Super Savers, Best Buy Blue Label Program, YouTube E-Commerce, Retail Rentals. Smart Marketing: Weather-proof: If It’s Freezing It’s Free, Uniqlo Live Vending Machines, Teen Vogue Haute Spot, Virgin Mobile Txt2clothe.
  • Favorite Clothing Store – Urban Outfitters is the top store for trendsetters and Walmart is the top for mainstream
  • Favorite Non-Clothing Store – Target is the top store for trendsetters and Walmart is the top for mainstream
  • Ones To Watch: Retail – Eryn Brinie, Space NKApothecary, The Organic Pharmacy, Topshop NYC, Space 15 Twenty, We The Free, H & M Home Collection.