There’s a new “value equation” being driven by Millennial consumers, according to Jeff Fromm, president of Kansas City marketing firm FutureCast and co-author of “Marketing to Millennials.”

The equation, which Fromm has copyrighted, has to do with understanding what constitutes value for Millennials.

“The fundamental shift that has occurred with Millennials is a change in the value equation from the sum of functional and emotional benefits to the sum of functional, emotional and participative benefits,” Fromm said.

“And, instead of divided by price, it’s now divided by total costs. That’s a major change. So we have a different proxy for brand value today than we did a few years ago, and it’s driven by Millennials.”

Value-seeking Millenniels are as ready to trade down as they are to trade up to get what they want, Fromm said, “because they’re savvy enough through crowdsourced information to know that the private label item in the grocery store is made exactly the same as the brand, so they’ll get the private label.”

“In their shopping cart, you’ll see brands and private labels—and it’s a matter of what is important to them,” he said. “They’re very loyal. They’re also capable of processing more information more rapidly from more sources, including their friend network, than any generation before them because they’ve grown up doing this.

“So we get interesting behavior that’s confused as, ‘Well, they’re just disloyal or disinterested.’ No, they’re already past that. You’re stuck.”