Exploring Consumer Culture and Branding Strategies

Have you ever wondered why there are 8,000 trends at any given time? It’s because trends are extremely profitable! This week, Alyssa is joined by Amanda Mull, senior reporter at Bloomberg Businessweek and consumer culture expert, to unpack the Trend Story Industrial Complex that drives fashion and beauty media. Tune in for Amanda’s fascinating insights on the role of the press in inducing demand for trendy items, how the explosion of both paparazzi photos and fast fashion in the mid-2000s marked a turning point for the traditional trend cycle, why a lack of innovation has led to a rapid ramp-up of trend media, whether we’re approaching critical mass for crowdsourcing trend ideas from TikTok, how influencers have become assignment editors for modern trend stories, why digital media has an incentive to produce recommendation and shopping content in general (thanks in large part to affiliate links), whether the tide is turning and people feel like they’re being pressed to buy too many products, Gen Z’s fraught relationship with consumption (specifically, the contradiction between their beliefs and their behavior when it comes to shopping), the dangers of young people thinking about culture as a marketing exercise, how the luxury game has become more like the fast fashion game over the past two decades, and what could happen if we no longer have new, creative ideas to feed the increasingly sped up consumer machine.