Tired of scraping the sticky stuff off desks, shoes, and water fountains? According to a report in Crain’s Chicago Business, gum no longer has a hold on teen tastes, despite experiments with wild flavor combinations and smaller, less expensive packages. Apparently, with the cost of a pack of chewing gum hovering close to $2.00, teens are choosing other snacks to get them through the day.
Matthew Hudak, a U.S. packaged goods analyst in Euromonitor International’s Chicago office says that Millennials, roughly defined as those age 13 to 35, “simply aren’t interested and instead are doing different things. Older consumers don’t tend to chew it as much and use mints for breath-freshening.” This trend runs contrary to a 2012 article in USA Today that alleged that teens are using gum as a “fashion accessory.” Here’s to hoping that fewer books are coming back to the library with sticks of gum used as bookmarks!
This article was featured in School Library Journal's SLJTeen enewsletter. Subscribe today to have more articles like this delivered to you twice a month for free.
About Dodie Ownes
Comment Policy: Your words are your own, so be nice and helpful if you can. We accept clean XHTML in comments, but don't overdo it and please limit the number of links submitted in your comment. For more info, see the full Terms of Use.