Gen Z women are orchestrating a power shift.

Gen Z women are demanding something radically different from previous generations: they don't want products built for them, they want to build with the people designing them.

Gen Z women are launching businesses at unprecedented rates, prioritizing authenticity over polish and community over hierarchy. Research shows Gen Z is the most entrepreneurial generation, with women leading the charge, creating businesses rooted in sustainability, inclusivity, and transparency.

This translates directly to how they view leadership. Traditional top-down management feels antiquated to a generation that grew up organizing horizontally. Leadership transparency must evolve into participatory design, from strategy to values. Gen Z women expect to be included in task forces, internal innovation labs, and even co-authoring cultural values, not brought in after designs are finalized.

For brands, this co-creation mindset is non-negotiable. 65% of Gen Z say they like when companies have a moral message, and authenticity ranks as the top characteristic Gen Z consumers look for in brand content. They value community-driven content over perfect, curated posts, and 92% agree the community surrounding a brand impacts how they feel about the company.

This extends to money itself. Nearly 40% of Gen Z openly discuss salaries at work, almost double the rate of Gen X. 71% desire internal salary transparency, and 81% believe pay transparency can lead to improved pay equity. They view financial literacy not as individual advancement but as collective empowerment, sharing financial strategies openly on social media.

The implications are profound. Companies wanting Gen Z women's loyalty must rethink everything, create distributed leadership opportunities early, and deliver equitable pay backed by transparency.

What we're witnessing isn't just generational preference, it's a recalibration of power. Gen Z women understand that true equity comes from building systems themselves, not accessing ones built by others. And they're not waiting for an invitation.

The collapse of Saks Global, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on January 13 after missing a $100 million interest payment, is more than just another retail casualty. It's a flashing warning signal about the fundamental transformation happening in how women spend money, what they value, and where traditional retailers went catastrophically wrong.

Here's what makes the current moment so revealing: women's economic power is surging. According to Bank of America Institute data, women's median discretionary spending grew 0.9% year-over-year through November 2024, outpacing men's growth for two consecutive years. Women's median annual income growth continues to exceed men's, driven by stronger pay increases when changing jobs, a gap that reached its highest level in over three years by late 2024.

Women now control up to $31 trillion in global consumer spending and make roughly 80% of buying decisions. Their labor force participation has increased, supported by higher graduation rates, with women's productivity advancing on two fronts: education and workforce engagement.

Yet this expanding economic influence hasn't saved the retailers that once catered to them.

Saks Global's bankruptcy is merely the most dramatic in a cascade of failures targeting women consumers. The parent company of Saks Fifth Avenue, Neiman Marcus, and Bergdorf Goodman had struggled to pay vendors even before acquiring Neiman Marcus in 2024 for $2.7 billion--a debt-fueled deal that left the company with thinner inventory, driving shoppers away.

The broader picture is equally stark. According to Retail Dive's bankruptcy tracker, 2024 and 2025 saw wave after wave of retailers targeting female consumers file for protection:

Joann (crafts retailer): Filed for bankruptcy twice in under a year, ultimately closing all physical stores in 2025
Claire's (accessories): Filed in 2025 before selling to private equity
Party City: Liquidated nearly 700 stores after filing in December 2024
Kate Moss's Cosmoss: Entered voluntary liquidation less than three years after launching premium skincare

More than 8,100 stores closed across the U.S. in 2025, up 12% from 2024, with predictions pointing to 15,000 closures anticipated for the near future.

What Killed Them: Three Converging Forces

Direct-to-Consumer Revolution: Women want brand-owned flagships or frictionless digital purchases, not the compromised middle ground department stores offered.

Experience-Over-Objects Shift: Spending on high-end hotels significantly outpaced luxury retail as women redirected dollars toward travel, dining, and events over material possessions.

Values-Driven Transparency: 88% of millennial women let customer ratings influence purchases and 57% say brand values matter, demanding traceable supply chains and pricing transparency that traditional retailers couldn't deliver.

Five Signals for the Future

Secondhand Sophistication: The luxury resale market could account for 20% of luxury revenue by 2030 as women view pre-owned luxury as sustainable and smart.

Strategic Spending: Women are more likely than men to seek sales, use coupons, and read reviews, they're spending more strategically, not impulsively.

Investment Piece Mentality: Women increasingly focus on long-staying value items like jewelry and handbags that retain worth, viewing purchases as financial decisions.

Digital-Physical Integration: Over 70% of women shop online, but physical retail survives only when it delivers emotion and personalized connection digital can't replicate.

These bankruptcies aren't warnings about declining female spending power, they're final notices to an industry that refused to evolve. Women have more money, more choices, and more information than ever before. They're voting with their wallets for experiences over objects, values over labels, and transparency over tradition. The retailers that will thrive won't be those with the biggest real estate footprints or the oldest brand names, but those that recognize women as the sophisticated, value-conscious, experience-seeking economic force they've become, and build entirely new models around that reality.