Blog: recession will be helped by 'reproduction mania'

Heather Strang, blogger for Retail Design Diva, isn't particularly worried about the effect a possible recession would have on retail. No, she says, there are too many good things on the way — literally, since 2006 saw the largest U.S. baby boom in 50 years, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. Strang says rising birth rates bode well for retailers of all sorts.

"Babies grow up to be pre-teens, who have an insatiable desire to buy clothes for brand purposes only, hang out in malls inventing the next form of American slang, and consume, consume, consume," she writes. "It gets worse — or better depending on how you look at it — as the 'baby' grows into a teenager with needs for a car, even better clothes, cell phones and gobs of accessories."

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