Downshifters threatening brands?
View(s):“There are people who have put together the connection between overconsumption and the degradation of the environment, but there are also baby boomers who are just saturated with material life,” explains Elaine Stover of Greensboro, N.C., who, along with her husband, teaches a one-day seminar called “Lifestyle Simplification.”
Denzil Perera
“I felt if I took less money I’d be taking a step backward and denying my potential as a human being,” she says. Eventually, she and her husband, David Heitmiller, a corporate product manager, did downshift, saving 30% of their income over three years to finance their corporate exits. They tell the tale in their book, “Getting a Life.” “We saw that we could live with less income and still be happy,” she says.
But that’s difficult if you measure your self-worth in status and money. And, “for many people in the corporate world, that’s the measure,” Dr. Brown says. “But if other things are truly more important to you, you should go for it.”
The above are some of the extracts of recently published articles on ‘Downshifting’. This dialogue should begin with the word ‘People’ instead of ‘consumers’ as marketing has always been talking of consumers than people. That was one of the reasons why marketing couldn’t remain relevant to people in this new day and age. World is taking a U-turn and are going back to basics. Over-consumption, consumerism, consumption-based happiness will not have much space anymore in this backdrop.
Who are Downshifters?
Downshifters are the people who have voluntarily or involuntarily reduced their consumption and their over dependency on consumption in their eternal struggle to find happiness. Economists explained that people are involved in an eternal struggle to maximize their utility in which they always take a rational call, the economically rational man. In addition to economics – sociology and psychology both analysed how people take decisions in groups and as individuals in maximizing satisfaction and utility value of their decisions and these have contributed towards the construct or marketing.
Marketing is assumed to be a mix or blend of economics, sociology and psychology. Satisfaction of consumers has always been at the core of marketing and whatever it takes to make consumers happy has been the science behind the discipline. But over the last few decades, Western theorists argued on the fact that; should consumption be the only way of satisfying consumers. Consumption has become a struggle as it’s about acquiring scares resources. As consumers need to acquire resources which are scares in order to satisfy their physiological needs, there was a need to have a mechanism to promote products. Marketing came into the picture as the mechanism which elaborates to producers and sellers as to how Marketing as a discipline could be utilized to increase sales to consumers. Over a period of time marketing evolved itself into many other areas such as branding, service marketing etc.
Economists also introduced the concept of ‘diminishing marginal returns’ to the concept of consumption to elaborate on the point at which consumers can get fed up or tired of consumption. The world is now reaching this point of return back to basics. COVID19 only expedited the process but the process had already begun. When the Economic recession hit the world in 2006/7, people realized that there is an option of downshifting. They had to give up on their income sources and certain consumption patterns that they were used to. At the same time another fraction of the society became downshifters by choice with the innate realization of the truth about happiness and consumption. Those who were forced to downshift due to loss of jobs and incomes became compulsory downshifters and those who gave up on unnecessary consumption became voluntary downshifters. Voluntary downshifting is becoming the latest trend which goes against consumerism which seeks pleasure in consumption. Hedonic pleasure or feelings associated with over consumption is no longer appreciated by the affluent markets. Hence, marketers are forced to pay a close attention to the reasons as to why consumers are becoming downshifters.
What drives downshifting?
Concern in preserving the environment, realizing the futility in over consumption, feeling of guilt made by depriving a fraction of the society who can’t even afford to satisfy their basic needs whilst another fraction enjoying luxury (the feeling of inequality), ethnocentric and religiosity are the drivers of this new trend.
This fundamental shift in behavior of consumers/people is having an inevitable impact on the way marketing and branding being carried out or executed. Failure to understand this will make your brand irrelevant and will also be purposeless. In order for your brand to remain relevant, current and also to be serving a purpose in the market, the brands need to work around these trends.
Where can brands begin this?
Brands first and foremost should come out of the framework of considering people as consumers. Fundamental issue with marketing is that it takes people as a bunch of creatures which are born to consume. People are shifting away from mere consumption and are trying to find the purpose of their own lives. If branding needs to be effective and successful, the fundamental shift that it needs to make is refraining from considering people as consumers. Therefore, it’s high time we humanize marketing and branding.
Humanizing Marketing and Branding
Humanizing branding and marketing will take an extra effort in a world where success is measured in terms of increase in sales and profits. But this ongoing notion of success actually depends heavily on over-consumption. Marketing has become the system which drives people to consume more so that brands can shine as performing brands. Who is going to be beneficiaries of over-consumption?
Brands spend more on promotions and communication than the actual product itself. Brands are being unethical when they use the power of celebrity endorsements to persuade people to believe in the fact that they have become celebrities due to the consumption of certain brands that are endorsed by them. Leaving aside the environmental damages caused to the planet, the dent in the social system is greater I must say. Promoting over consumption is adding costs to the product which is made to satisfy basic needs at times. Is this truly ethical?
Tools such as Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is embedded in brands to come out of the feeling of guilt as brands know that they are at fault. In real political sense, CSR is actually an enabler for brands which want to promote over consumption – not for the wellbeing of society but rather for wellbeing of the brand owners and makers.
In conclusion – downshifters are threatening the myth of consumption –based satisfaction which is promoted by brands and it’s a reaction from people who didn’t know how brands have been threatening the peace of mind of people for decades not the other way around.