As post-war "Baby Boomers" turn 50, they put a new slant on Bob Dylan's 1960s warning of rebellion "The Times They Are A'Changing" because of their sheer numbers, the cash in their pockets and their consumerism, he believes.

Jean-Paul Treguer, 44, is the founder of Paris-based Senioragency, which he says is Europe's first and only ad agency catering for the over-50s. Clad in denim shirt and jeans with a few silvery streaks in his hair, Treguer typifies the dynamism of consumers who will turn 50 over the next decade.

He expounded his marketing philosophy in an interview while taking part in a pre-production meeting for a margarine commercial. "Society as a whole does not want to see that the population is ageing. We are frightened," he told Reuters.

"This is a fear that has existed for centuries in ourJudeo-Christian societies where death is viewed as something terrible, and ageing is the ante-chamber of death," he said.

American firms, driven by the commercial logic of reaching the growing numbers of senior demographic groups and by powerful lobby groups for older people, are far ahead of the Europeans, he said. "In the US, companies have been working on the senior market for a long time...in France we follow theories but not money. We have preconceived ideas and taboos," he said.

Percentage of the population

The over-50s represented 29.6 per cent of the French population in 1990 and are expected to account for 37 per cent in 2010 and 41.4 per cent in 2020, a study by French National Statistics Institute (INSEE) predicted in 1995.

Treguer divides the group into four age segments with varying wealth and spending characteristics which need different marketing approaches: the 50-59s and 60-74s are both still dynamic consumers, but for those aged 75-84 and the over-85s, poverty and ill-healthput a brake on spending.

In Western Europe, the 50-59 age group is set to rise from 34 million people in 1988 to 45 million in 2005, while the 60-74s totalled 41 million in 1988 and could get to 45 million by 2005, Treguer says, citing INSEE figures from 1997.

The younger of these groups can be hedonists enjoying a new-found freedom. Couples may have two pensions because each partner has worked, as well as an inheritance from their own parents and spare cash after their children left home. Such people do not shrink from spending as if it were a sin, as their elder predecessors did. "A lot of people take up cyber-surfing at 70," Treguer said. They are experienced consumers with the time to research what's on offer before they buy, he said.

Treguer thinks the advertising industry, staffed mainly by young people, ignores or misunderstands this market. "If you meet someone over 40 in an advertising agency he is either a client or the boss." On top of that, modern marketing has sprung from the development ofworld brands which are aimed at the young, like Coke, Pepsi, McDonald's, Adidas or Nike.

"The divorce between what marketeers think and reality is bigger and bigger," Treguer said. His recommendations for marketing to the over-50s include running "infomercials"-commercial breaks designed for their information content.

Since older people tend to watch TV during the day, when advertising airtime is cheaper, and are ready to concentrate for longer than younger consumers, such ads can run to length. For 1.0 million French francs ($161,700)-cheap in advertising terms-a company could buy three months of daytime TV spots with a high level of repetition, he said.

Treguer praised initiatives such as a car insurance policy made cheaper for the over-50s because its premium did not have to include the cost of covering reckless younger drivers.

He also welcomed a campaign by beauty products firm Nivea, which launched cosmetics for older skins in 1994 with an ad showing a silver-haired model with a lined face.That broke an unwritten rule that models in ads must be young and nubile.