As the holiday season comes to an end, I find myself reflecting on my shopping experiences over the past few weeks. Like most women, I did the majority of the shopping for Christmas. If my husband did shop, it was certainly with the benefit of my input. Research overwhelmingly suggests that women make the vast majority of household purchase decisions. Who “makes” the money is actually not as significant as who spends it when it comes to consumer behavior. Whether you’re a working mom or stay-at-home mom, you likely make or influence the vast majority of purchases in your family. As such, we should expect (if not demand) that companies meet our needs. But what if this went beyond meeting our product needs? As powerful consumers, companies should be very concerned with making women and especially moms happy and this goes far beyond products.

While there have been improvements for women in the workforce over the past few decades, there are still staggering statistics related to women’s inability to make significant in-roads at the highest levels in corporations (still most high level executives and CEO’s are men). In fact, as I am exploring in my dissertation research, women transition out of the workforce at much greater rates than men. There is much debate as to why this is, but much of the modern feminist literature suggests that women “opting-out” of the workforce are doing so as a result of a successful career model essentially designed for men, with women who desire career success being expected to adjust. The only way companies will begin to care about creating environments conducive to women’s success is if we make it worth their while.

We have seen the impact of the “go green” movement on consumer purchasing behavior. People support companies who are good to the environment. I would like to see a “mommy movement” where women flex those consumer muscles to support companies that are good to working women. Each year Working Mother magazine puts out their list of the top 100 companies for working mothers. This is a great move in the right direction, but as powerful consumers, what are we doing with the information? What if women actually considered this list in making their purchasing decisions? If women make the majority of the purchasing decisions (and we do) why shouldn’t we expect companies to support women’s workforce success? It’s like the saying “don’t bite the hand that feeds you”. If you don’t have women at the highest levels in your company, if you don’t offer strong maternity policies, job share, flex time, work-life balance initiatives, the types of things that help women succeed, why should we buy your products? Women need to unite as powerful, informed consumers! It’s time to be aware and be proactive in supporting companies that support women.