Audience: the Acorn system

The Acorn system is very useful when trying to decide who your target audience should be. This  system places people in to categories based on alot of things such as : ethnicity, gender, jobs, income, age and qualifications.
Here is a very brief overview of the system from my blog for the AS media course last year :

BAND A : These are the wealthy upper middle classes that are proffessionals such as doctors or are high up managers, executives, administrators.

BAND B : People in this band are normally middle class with intermediate manager jobs or other respected proffesional jobs such as teachers.

BAND C1 : This is generally the lower middle classes with fair incomes. They will have jobs such as junior managers or semi proffessional workers.

BAND C2 : These people are usually skilled working classes who will have often have skilled manual work jobs.

BAND D : This is working class people who are often manual workers in semi-skilled/unskilled jobs such as mechanics.

BAND E : These are the lowest earners who will often have very basic or casual jobs.This bracket also includes things like state pensioners, widowers(single earners) and the unemployed.

Here is the newest and very detailed version of the system from: http://www.caci.co.uk/acorn-classification.aspx

Wealthy Achievers

Wealthy Executives

• 01 - Affluent mature professionals, large houses
• 02 - Affluent working families with mortgages
• 03 - Villages with wealthy commuters
• 04 - Well-off managers, larger houses

Affluent Greys

• 05 - Older affluent professionals
• 06 - Farming communities
• 07 - Old people, detached houses
• 08 - Mature couples, smaller detached houses

Flourishing Families

• 09 - Larger families, prosperous suburbs
• 10 - Well-off working families with mortgages
• 11 - Well-off managers, detached houses
• 12 - Large families & houses in rural areas

Urban Prosperity

Prosperous Professionals

• 13 - Well-off professionals, larger houses and converted flats
• 14 - Older Professionals in detached houses and apartments

Educated Urbanites

• 15 - Affluent urban professionals, flats
• 16 - Prosperous young professionals, flats
• 17 - Young educated workers, flats
• 18 - Multi-ethnic young, converted flats
• 19 - Suburban privately renting professionals

Aspiring Singles

• 20 - Student flats and cosmopolitan sharers
• 21 - Singles & sharers, multi-ethnic areas
• 22 - Low income singles, small rented flats
• 23 - Student Terraces

Comfortably Off

Starting Out

• 24 - Young couples, flats and terraces
• 25 - White collar singles/sharers, terraces

Secure Families

• 26 - Younger white-collar couples with mortgages
• 27 - Middle income, home owning areas
• 28 - Working families with mortgages
• 29 - Mature families in suburban semis
• 30 - Established home owning workers
• 31 - Home owning Asian family areas

Settled Suburbia

• 32 - Retired home owners
• 33 - Middle income, older couples
• 34 - Lower income people, semis

Prudent Pensioners

• 35 - Elderly singles, purpose built flats
• 36 - Older people, flats

Moderate Means

Asian Communities

• 37 - Crowded Asian terraces
• 38 - Low income Asian families

Post Industrial Families

• 39 - Skilled older family terraces
• 40 - Young family workers

Blue Collar Roots

• 41 - Skilled workers, semis and terraces
• 42 - Home owning, terraces
• 43 - Older rented terraces

Hard Pressed

Struggling Families

• 44 - Low income larger families, semis
• 45 - Older people, low income, small semis
• 46 - Low income, routine jobs, unemployment
• 47 - Low rise terraced estates of poorly-off workers
• 48 - Low incomes, high unemployment, single parents
• 49 - Large families, many children, poorly educated

Burdened Singles

• 50 - Council flats, single elderly people
• 51 - Council terraces, unemployment, many singles
• 52 - Council flats, single parents, unemployment

High Rise Hardship

• 53 - Old people in high rise flats
• 54 - Singles & single parents, high rise estates

Inner City Adversity

• 55 - Multi-ethnic purpose built estates
• 56 - Multi-ethnic, crowded flats