Luxury Brands are Targeting Global "Yummies": Young Urban Males

Luxury fashion may be switching gender and age roles. In much of the world now, the most attractive demographic for such companies as Burberry and Coach isn't middle-aged women with sky-high credit limits; it's twenty-something men with smartphones and self-esteem issues.

At least that's the theory put forth recently by three researchers at HSBC. The future of retail is in young, urban males-or as HSBC dubs them, "Yummies" (a handy verbal shortcut if one can say it without gagging).