A beurgeois is a middle-class (and upwards) Muslim born in a working-class area of France to parents of Maghrebi origin, who continues to proclaim their roots and who is aged between 30 and 40 years old with a successful professional career, a high purchasing power and a demand for a certain quality of life.
[citation needed] The "beurgeois" among France's estimated 6-7 million-strong Muslim community are an emerging economic demographic, being catered to by a market in halal food and drinks.
These offer a wide range of halal products including alcohol-free champagne and foie gras approved by Islamic law (an unexpected success first introduced into supermarket chains across the country in 2008 at the end of the Muslim fast of Ramadan).
These include:[13] Nestlé's French operations, supermarket chain Groupe Casino, Pierre Martinet (France's biggest prepared salad maker), fast-food chain Quick (which has a number of halal-only burger bars), Hal'shop (a new supermarket in a Paris suburb which sells only halal food- and plenty of French dishes), flourishing Muslim corner shops (selling exclusively halal foods and drinks including eggs, turkey and pork-free sausages as well as alcohol-free "champagne", known as Cham'Alal), as well as Carrefour (the world's second-largest retailer by sales after Wal-Mart), which is considering launching its own line of halal foods.
Claude Capillon, the mayor of Rosny-sous-Bois, east of Paris, where the fast-food chain Quick has an all-halal restaurant, sent the company a letter saying it was discriminating against non-Muslim customers.
[14] The beurgeois are not only a useful demographic to retailers but also to French politicians—and somewhat unlike their previous generations, the group does not intend have higher levels of apathy when it comes to the relationship of the sector to the country's government.