ENID — Enid attracts interest from many businesses that cater to children, teenagers and young adults, officials say.
Rickey Hayes, the retail development consultant for the city of Enid, says businesses that sell soft goods such as clothing, and stores that sell sporting goods or electronics are some of the stores he gets the most interest from in regard to locating in Enid.
Enid also has a large population of young families that companies take interest in, said Brent Kisling, executive director of Enid Regional Development Alliance. A lot of those families, he said, live at Vance Air Force Base.
“Those are young families that are looking for certain types of clothing products and green products,” Kisling said.
Enid’s 2010 Demographic Profile from U.S. Census Bureau shows the highest age group concentrations in Enid are children under the age of 5 and young adults ages 25 to 29. Both population groups each make up 8 percent of Enid’s total population.
That’s not to say there isn’t a healthy concentration of older folks here, too. According to the census data, 7.1 percent of Enid is between 50 and 54 years old.
Kisling said there is a balance of businesses both in Enid and what the development alliance is looking for that cater to young interests and interests of the older population.
Enid has many stores that serve the needs of the younger generation, Hayes said.
“We just worked on a deal to help Old Navy stay in town,” he said. “That’s a retailer that caters to a younger demographic.”
Other stores like Hastings, which sells electronics, music and books, or clothing stores like JC Penney and Dillard’s, also cater to younger clientele, he said.
The demographics of Enid or any other city can be used by retailers to decide if they will locate here.
“Different retailers have different target consumer groups that they key in on,” Hayes said.
He said the retailers that are interested in Enid have noticed a “fairly well-educated, younger, trendy population.”
The numbers
Aside from the 8 percent of Enid’s residents being under the age of 5 or between 25 and 30, 7.1 percent of residents are between the ages of 5 and 9, and another 7.1 percent are between 20 and 24 years old.
Another population group that comprises 7.1 percent of Enid’s population is the 50-54 age group. The 45-49 age group has the third-highest population at 6.6 percent of the total population.
The concentration percentage gradually decreases as the population gets older. For example, 6.3 percent of Enid residents are between the ages of 55 and 59, but only 3.3 percent are between 70 and 74 years old.
The median age of Enid is 36. That means if you took the ages of everyone in Enid, lined them up and moved in one by one from both sides, the age you would come to would be 36.
According to census data, the median age for males in Enid is about 34, while the median age for females is about 38.
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