While Millennials have been the focus of many businesses trying to capture a market of consumers with spending power, there is a generation of emerging guests for whom expectations about how brand experiences should unfold are changing what experiences will be like in a digitally mediated future. Understanding the influence of our digital culture on the young brains of emerging shoppers is a must when providing experiences that matter. How does a customer experience remain relevant when you consider that the idea of a ‘Generation Gap’ is morphing into a “Brain Gap” between ‘older’ and Gen Z guests? Their propensity to see themselves in the brand experience as direct participants rather than observers, or simple consumers, will lead to questioning if brands will matter when demographic segmentation shrinks to a ‘market segment of one’ and where the brand of ‘Me’ shapes products, services and experiences Learning Objectives: • What our reliance on digital technology, social media and the internet is doing to our brain and how this will influence the design of the places we create • How a the ‘denizens of the digishere’ will lead a paradigm shift in customer experience place-making and will usher in a new paradigm for customer engagement • Why the power of story is critical to sharing emotional connections between brands and the customers they serve