What do the things you buy really say about you? And how are companies using that to get you to spend more than you might want. Consumer Culture Expert Professor Sarah Grace joins us to explain the growing psychology behind consumer culture. We talk shopping display secrets, fast fashion, conscious consumerism and the subtle messages major brands are sending. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Annoying Public Behaviors.
Professor Sarah Grace: 01:48
Pointless: 29:34
Top 5 Public Annoyances: 43:20
https://www.tiktok.com/@profsarahgrace (Prof. Sarah Grace TikTok)
http://sarahcgrace.com (Prof. Sarah Grace Website)
Interview with Consumer Culture Expert Professor Sarah Grace
Nick VinZant 0:11
Hey everybody welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant Coming up in this episode, shopping secrets, and public annoyances,
Professor Sarah Grace 0:22
culture, in a way has been replaced by consumer culture. Because the things that shaped us, a lot of what is around us is defined by material objects that we buy, what is XYZ company really selling, you know, kind of romanticizes you and it gets you out of your rational, unreflective mind. And it kind of takes you like to this dreamy state where you might make an irrational decision and spend way more than you thought you were going to make. If you had one of those cars that would say a few different things about you. One, that you're an early adopter of trends, you are forward thinking and innovative, but you also care what people think about you.
Nick VinZant 1:08
I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, or leave a review, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So we've all heard the sayings about how you are your stuff, you are the things that you buy. But why do you buy the things that you buy? Our first guest is an expert in the psychological ways that brands used to try and get you to buy their stuff. And what the stuff that you buy really says about you. This is consumer culture expert, Professor Sarah Grace. So what is consumer culture really
Professor Sarah Grace 1:50
hard to explain, but culture is something that is around us no matter where we are. And it's one of those things that's often unreflected on, but it influences so many aspects of our life. Well, in our modern worlds, culture, in a way has been replaced by consumer culture. Because the things that shape us, it's not just values, it's not just music, it's not just where we go to church, or if we go to church, a lot of what is around us is defined by material objects that we buy, and things that are marketed towards us. So consumer culture is this thing that we all navigate daily, because every day we wake up, and we try to decide, I'm going to wear this and present myself to the world this way, I'm going to pull out this brand of computer and it's going to have these different stickers on it to communicate something both to myself about myself, but also to others about who I am. And a lot of times our identity and our values and the way that we kind of get by in this world, we navigate through the help of consumer objects.
Nick VinZant 3:01
But it's it's true in the sense that right like we kind of our our stuff, like you could look at the things that I wear and that I own in my car and pretty much get a really good idea of exactly who I am. Is there is there a point like looking back in history where you can identify like, this is where that really changed. And now you are your stuff.
Professor Sarah Grace 3:23
Even back in the Middle Ages, there were gilts of people who grouped together based off of their trade. And different guilds were identified by their clothing, or what they wore, or even think about royal royalty, they were certain colors. And so you could identify who was of different social standings based off of their objects that they adorned on their body. And they actually prevented people who are peasants or lower levels than them from being able to wear certain colors or wear certain things. So actually, this idea, and it goes back to the ancient Romans and Greeks, too.
Nick VinZant 4:00
So like how are companies trying to get us to buy stuff we don't need.
Professor Sarah Grace 4:05
So if you think about basic economics, there's supply and there's demand. So the way that you asked your question assumes that there is more supply than demand. And companies are trying to push things on consumers that they don't want. And historically, like when sales and marketing originated in the early 1900s. That is how a lot of companies operated as they would like create a ton of this type of vacuum and they would have door to door salesmen. And they would have people go out and try to sell this thing that they already created. Well in the 50s 60s 70s that started to switch and marketers really started focusing on well what do consumers want and started creating things, less of a push system and more of a pool system so started creating things based off of what consumers either said they want one and versus via research and focus groups and those sorts of things. Or based off of what consumers were actually buying, so they might have looked at point of sale data, which is a technology that was introduced in the mid century. And they might have said, well, consumers are buying a lot of cans, pineapple. Let's make more of that. And let's make more varieties of that. So the thinking around our companies pushing us things versus are we demanding things and they're responding to that, that desire, the shifting, and that has changed. So I think it's a little bit of both. But for companies to grow, they have to create something new, too, so that consumers will want to replace the things that they already have with those new things. And so that's where we get trend cycles in the marketplace. And the easiest industry to see this in is with fashion. So fashion trend cycles are a beautiful example. They've gotten really short in the last few years. Whereas people used to buy a new dress, maybe once a year, and then they would buy another new dress next year. And they would keep those in their wardrobe for years and years and years and repair them over time as they wore out. Now, the trend cycling what is in fashion, or what is on trend, has shortens. And so you as a consumer feel like I need to buy more often. And I need to replace these things that I already have. That may be perfectly fine. And innovation is a good thing. I don't want that to come off the wrong way companies are incentive buys to innovate. But sometimes they innovate needlessly. And that's when we have access. And you also have consumers feeling like they have to replace perfectly good stuff and get rid of things just because it's no longer maybe on trend.
Nick VinZant 6:54
Who's driving the car, though? Like, are we driving the car? Are the companies driving the car? Like I could have the
Professor Sarah Grace 7:03
I don't know, anybody know, knows who is driving the car. I think that there are people who have really strong stances, and some people would say it is purely companies driving the car, through marketing through promotion through incessant advertising, they're spinning up the wheels of consumer desire. I think that there's some truth in that. But I also think going back to consumer culture, if companies stopped advertising today, they spent not another dime on advertising. We wouldn't know what to do, we wouldn't be content, or know how to not still buy new stuff that we don't need.
Nick VinZant 7:46
Is there a segment of society that kind of keeps that engine going more than other ones? Oh, I
Professor Sarah Grace 7:53
hate to point fingers. I think if you're using the fashion industry, again, social media has really changed this because if you are a high schooler in the Midwest, and you went to school, and you're walking down your hallway, you might have seen like, oh, there's some like new trends. And like, maybe I need to go to the mall and pick up this new sequined purse or whatever it is. But you only kind of saw what was in your community. Social media obviously blew that out. And there are there's this new trend of influencers, posting shopping hauls, especially from fast fashion retailers, like Shi n or forever 21. But primarily Sheehan and I think that, you know, they put those out on YouTube, they put those out on tick tock or Instagram. And they have tons of people just watching them open these $500 orders from this month. And then next month, they're going to do the same thing. And they normalize this idea of it's normal to get a new thing for this one occasion or event, wear it, take a picture and it posted on social media and not touch it again. Because it was so cheap. It was a $7 pair of shorts, that, you know, I got my $7 worth, and then move on. And so again, I hate to point the finger on any one group. But influencer culture is one that has popped up in the last few years that I think keeps that alive. And it also because it's global, you see people, you know, consume in ways that you might not have seen if it was just the people that you saw in person. I
Nick VinZant 9:39
have a personal bias in this that may kind of contaminate the conversation. But I've always been the person that like look, I got the same T shirt I had in high school. I've been driving the same car for 10 years, right? Like I buy nothing new. So my question is though, like, can we stop this? Because if we suddenly stopped buying this stuff, then what happens to the People who got hired to make this stuff, right, like there's, there's this the economy collapse if we get ourselves out, have we painted ourselves into a corner with this?
Professor Sarah Grace 10:08
And I think that that is a really good question. And when you're thinking about any kind of system change, or promoting some sort of systemic change, you have to think of all the different stakeholders who are affected. And what's interesting about our consumer culture is that our consumption and our production is pretty far apart from most of the items that we consume, whether it's food, whether it's clothes, whether it's home goods, meaning that we have, we've offshored most of our production. So I took an economic development class from an amazing professor in my undergrad, who was from Bangladesh. And this was the point the exact question that she posed to us is, okay, we stop buying fast fashion clothes that are made by women and Bangladesh, what happens to those women? What are their alternatives? And I don't know the answer to your question. But I do think what is important is for us to realize how connected our consumption behaviors are both good and bad, globally. So the things that you consume in the United States, in a Midwestern suburb, in New York City, in California, wherever impact people across the world, in both good and bad ways. It does give people jobs. But the question is, are those jobs safe? Are they paying a living wage? Do those people have jobs, but then their river or their water source is polluted because of the factory that's in their town? And so it's a very complicated question that I can't provide an answer to. But I think that you have to think of all the good and bad things that are connected.
Nick VinZant 12:00
Do most people when they buy something, like, do we know what we're really doing? Do we know who's actually making this? What their principles as a company are? Or am I just like grabbing this thing off the shelf and like, yeah, that's a medium t shirt. And that's what I'm looking for.
Professor Sarah Grace 12:16
I think for most of us, shopping, and consuming is a passive behavior. It's an unreflected upon behavior, it's just part of what we do. It's just normal. And it's not something that we stop and think a whole lot about. And you probably picked the one that your parents used to buy. And that's the one that you get, and that's the one that you buy for the rest of your life. And you just don't think about it. There are very few times that we stop and like, really think about our purchases. If you're buying a house, or a car, or an engagement ring, something big you stop and you really think and reflect on it. But most of our consumer behavior is that more like fast, habitual, like we're just kind of moving through the actions and conscious consumerism. To me, people define it differently is that act of just stopping pausing thinking through slowing down in the way that we think about our consumption behavior.
Nick VinZant 13:19
Are you ready for some listener submitted questions? Sure. It seems to be a big thing about brands being authentic. Are brands really authentic? Or is this fake authenticity that they're now basically, like, we figured out how to act like that? 31, I guess, what do you think about this push for authenticity,
Professor Sarah Grace 13:41
brands are kind of put into this place where they have to differentiate themselves, and be unique. And one way that they are unique is to have a personality. And if you have a personality, you don't want to have a phony personality. So of course, you want to have an authentic personality. And I think that for a lot of brands, it differs. But the way that a brand can be authentic, is to go back to their origin story. Every brand has a founder, and a reason for being someone somewhere decided this product needs to be here. And here's why. And so if a brand can go back to that origin story of why the brand exists in the first place, maybe tap into the spirit or the ethos of the founder. That's the way to create an authentic brands, not to try to contrive a story that you think your consumers want to hear.
Nick VinZant 14:36
Is there a store that stands out in your mind, like you walk in and the way that it's organized, or set up the lighting, whatever, gets people to maybe buy something that they otherwise wouldn't have?
Professor Sarah Grace 14:52
That's a hilarious question, because I'm literally doing a Tik Tok series on this right now. And In it, all of the videos start off and they say, What is XYZ company really selling, and kind of paint a picture of how the brand makes you feel a certain way when you enter your space, and how it transports you to a different state of feeling a certain way about yourself or, you know, kind of romanticizes you and it gets you out of your rational, unreflective mind. And it kind of takes you like to this dreamy state where you might make an irrational decision and spend way more than you thought you were going to make. And so a brand truly sweeps you off your feet. And then you walk out and you're like, how did I just spend $200 on a tea kettle? Because the object itself is maybe nice, but it's not that nice. So to answer your question, a couple that I've featured recently are anthropology, which is a retailer that mostly caters to women's clothing and home goods, stationery, mugs, candles, things like that, and they sell an entire feeling of kind of like, like, what's the word?
Nick VinZant 16:20
I know what you're, I know what you're trying to like, right? Like, I've got my life together. And it's good kind of feeling
Professor Sarah Grace 16:27
that to that too. But also, like, I am a free spirit who has my life together, right? It's not, because you have to have a lot of money to shop there. So you have to have some sort of income coming in. But you also it's not like your J Crew preppy, you know, blazer style, it's this bohemian kind of free spirit vibe as well. And so it might even be that it's offering you an escape from your nine to five corporate job into this imagined state where you're really a free spirit going to a Grateful Dead concert. So anthropology does a great job of romanticizing the consumer, and they spend a lot of time in each of their stores, merchandising their product, they hire local artists to come in and do different window displays, they flip and rotate the way that their merchandise is displayed. I've heard on a weekly basis so that if you walk in every week, it feels a little bit different, even though it's the same merchandise.
Nick VinZant 17:34
Is there an example of one that's the exact opposite?
Professor Sarah Grace 17:38
Hmm. Well, anthropology is trying to sell you on a motion, so that you'll pay a little bit more. A lot of your lower price retailers are not trying to sell you any kind of an emotion. They're just trying to serve that functional need for you. So if you think of like $1 tree, or $1, General, you go in there and there is no romanticization is basically the product and the prices. And it's very straightforward.
Nick VinZant 18:08
It's kind of I sometimes I guess I just feel like a fish that is always getting caught.
Professor Sarah Grace 18:14
Well, perhaps part of the reason for that is that market research is really good. And consumer research is really good. They know a lot about you. companies spend a lot of energy, you know, going on trend scouting hunts, and they will peruse the internet, and they'll practice social listening activities to see what people are talking about organically. And when they spot an opportunity. Of course, they're going to try to package it up. And how do we sell that back? Marketers have become ethnographers in a way where they observe the culture and they observe consumers and their natural habitats. And they stay out of the way. And they take notes and they make observations and they draw conclusions about what they see going on. Or they they take data and see what consumers are actually buying. And they use that without ever actually talking to the customer. And then they are able to put together an offering that resonates with the consumer, and the consumer gets it and they're like, Hmm, this company really knows me. And it's because yes, they are deeply observing your behavior.
Nick VinZant 19:32
What is Twiggy? Can you spell it CHEUGY Oh, I'm pronouncing that like so badly. It's a completely different word, isn't it? Okay, well, it's a different word. What is it actually? So what you're trying to say is Chuki which is a terrible sounding word. It's awful. It's awful choice. sounds better to me
Professor Sarah Grace 20:01
cheeky? Well, I don't even want to say it. Um, so Chuki is a word that I didn't know existed until I got on Tik Tok. And it basically goes like this, people would post a video, and they would say, these are the things that are two key. And then they would show, you know, a slideshow of consumer objects, like pants, or a style of shoe or whatever, that they viewed as a mix of both dated but also oversaturated. So it was a consumer trend at one point that was everywhere. accessible to many people, they got it, it was probably eight or so years ago. And now people are labeling it as Chuki. So instead of just saying like, Oh, that's outdated. It's like I say that, but it has a little bit of like an insult flair to it.
Nick VinZant 21:02
It's you're hopping on a trend too late, or you stayed on it too long.
Professor Sarah Grace 21:06
You stayed on it too long, is what it is. Um,
Nick VinZant 21:09
okay. You're very objective. So I'm gonna try to ask you this question in a way that maybe you can answer without saying if you judge it negatively or positively, what brand would tell you the most about somebody like, oh, this brand? I know exactly who you are.
Professor Sarah Grace 21:31
I think that the easier a brand is to describe the stronger the brand is. And this has changed too in the past couple years. Right. So the first brand that I wanted to say was Tesla. Oh, yeah, yeah, I feel like even in the past couple of years, because their production has ramped up and their distribution has increased. More people own Tesla's than before, but two years ago, if you'd asked me that question, easily, my answer would be Tesla. And if you had one of those cars, it would say a few different things about you. One, that you're an early adopter of trends, you are forward thinking and innovative, but you also care what people think about you. And I think that all three of those things are true of early Tesla owners. That might stir some people up.
Nick VinZant 22:24
Can you break down? Like in your research, have you done studied this so much that like you can break down people by exactly the brand? Like if I'm like, okay, Patagonia, right, can you like, so you are this,
Professor Sarah Grace 22:37
that's another one that's changed so much in the past 10 years, as well, like Patagonia 10 years ago, meant something much tighter because the people who wore Patagonia were in a very specific subset of mostly an outdoor crowd, like you are buying Patagonia to go hiking or to go rock climbing. But I live in a college town. So when I go to the store, I see Patagonia on everybody. Everybody's wearing Patagonia. And these are not necessarily people that are going out and participating in outdoor extreme sports. So that's a brand that the meaning has. I don't want to say evaporated, but the meaning has diluted over time, as people who are not in their target market adopt it. And that's what happens is the bigger brand gets their brand meeting is not as tight anymore.
Nick VinZant 23:36
Is there a brand that just tells you nothing about someone
Professor Sarah Grace 23:41
Apple like and I feel like 10 years ago, again, Apple might have told you a little bit of something. But now I think people buy Apple because it's the cultural norm. And I think that it's ubiquitous. But again, I'm on a in a college town. So it seems like everybody has an Apple computer. Or an everyone has air pods and I just don't feel like it tells me anything.
Nick VinZant 24:06
I feel like it tells me something if they have an Apple computer, not an iPhone necessarily, right? Like I don't see the difference in people's phones, like oh, that tells I mean unless it's like a burner phone, and then you're probably a drug dealer or you've got something else going on, you know, kind of knows something about you.
Professor Sarah Grace 24:25
I think that's a good point. So the iPhone brand in particular. Um, but when I was teaching, it was always interesting, everyone would sit down, pull out their laptops, and nine times out of 10 It was an apple. But those nine people were all very different.
Nick VinZant 24:43
I could ask you questions about every single brand that you could imagine forever, but to avoid that, like Are there any other brands that you would that stand out to you and like this means this or this doesn't mean anything?
Professor Sarah Grace 24:56
Hmm. Um, Starbucks is another brand that I've been really boggled by the last few years, when you read about the history of Starbucks, Howard Schultz, the previous CEO, he had gone to a trip on a trip to Milan, Italy and fell in love with cafe culture, and wanted to bring back to America. And so he got to the States, he tried to like recreate cafe culture, Starbucks as a third place to home and work, a place for people to like be in gathering and socialize the Starbucks brand to me, doesn't mean that anymore, and I can't put my finger on what it means. Because Starbucks has things like unicorn frappuccinos, which are kind of like a goofy Instagrammable play. They're not necessarily Italian coffee shop there, kind of all over the place. And that's a brand that is an example of, I think they have some work to do. What is great about brands is that they can be markers of things like quality, I think that brands play an important role. I just don't think that they should play an outsized role in our lives. So brands have a place because they do legitimize what you're buying, or at least that was the original idea. Some brands, take advantage of that basic assumption and make it seem like you're getting more than you're actually getting.
Nick VinZant 26:39
Like, I feel like a Mercedes Benz and BMW are basically kind of the same kind of car, at least in the United States. But the Mercedes Benz says something completely different about something that BMW says, like I look at someone who bought a Mercedes, and I think that's a person who's probably duty pretty, pretty financially. Well, not they're not ostentatious, and they want something that works. I see somebody, I've never met a man who drives a BMW, that's not a douchebag. That doesn't exist. That that's an immediate sign to me. Oh, that makes complete sense.
Professor Sarah Grace 27:11
Yeah, right. Well, that were that you used sign. I don't want to go off on a rabbit trail. But there's a whole field of marketing that looks at the study of sign meanings. And what things signify is called semiotics. And it's actually not just a marketing exclusive field, it actually was born out of linguistics. But semiotics is the study of science. And so that's part of what I studied in my training in consumer culture is to understand, okay, these things signify certain things, things to different people. And sometimes people interpret those meanings differently. So a lot of times marketers are trying to really tightly figure out what those meanings are, and then manage them, because they want everyone to interpret BMW the same way. That's when you have a strong brand. So like I said, Starbucks, I have a hard time defining what Starbucks is right now. And that's because different people would define the brand differently. And I don't think that they're managing those meanings in a really uniform way. And strong brands have a pretty uniform, meaning is shopping
Nick VinZant 28:22
difficult for you. Like, I feel like you would go into a store and just evaluate, like, every single thing like, Oh, I know why they put that display there.
Professor Sarah Grace 28:31
Shopping is not fun for me anymore. Sometimes if I can, like detach myself, but I feel like I know, too. You know too much.