About the market:

How to convince consumers to save more for their retirement is clearly a question that is not easy to answer. One step the government has taken to close the savings gap has been to introduce the stakeholder pension, a product specifically designed to encourage non-savers to take a more active role in saving for their retirement. The accessibility, flexibility and simplicity of this product were expected to appeal to a mass market of non-savers. However, it has now been more than four years since the launch of the stakeholder pension – and the development of this product has yet to prove itself a worthwhile endeavour. Sales of this product have been disappointing, and there is evidence that the product has failed to appeal to its target market.

Despite the lack of success in the product’s first few years, all is not lost. The stakeholder pension sector has potential to appeal to the millions of people who are not saving for their retirement, although tapping into this potential has thus far proved to be difficult. This report examines the current state of the stakeholder pension market and seeks to identify new opportunities for future growth.