Trends | LaRae's Blog

Archive for the ‘Trends’ Category

Is There a Long Tail in the Zero-Waste Trend?

Wednesday, October 28th, 2009

: Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Trash talk is trendy. Garbage is suddenly a hot topic for elegant dinner parties, schools, and community meetings. It’s not uncommon for the fashionable to spend hours discussing color (recycle bins), texture (carbon or nitrogen), and delivery dates (90 day compost). I grew up in the good old days when we kept our dirty laundry and smelly trash to ourselves, or at least out of sight. But zero-waste is a trend that is moving from the fringes of our consciousness into the mainstream.

San Francisco recently enforced the most comprehensive recycling law in the country. It’s now illegal to throw orange peels, coffee grounds, and grass clippings into the garbage. The law requires every citizen to utilize color-coded bins for trash, recycling, and compost. To many, this appears extreme and heavy-handed. In reality, San Francisco lags behind Nantucket, an island community in Massachusetts that moved to a strict trash program over ten years ago. Nantucket residents voted to recycle not only glass and paper, but also tires, batteries, and household appliances.

Trends are difficult to predict. Many of them pop up overnight, with no warning—for instance, who could have predicted the popularity of croc shoes? Others take time to percolate and slowly move from subtle awareness in the back of our mind to a priority in our daily life. In short, we need to be persuaded that recycling is the right way to spend our time and money.

We know that recycling and conservation of natural resources is a good thing; it always has been—the American Indian was onto that trend way before the Great White Father picked up on it. Americans have suffered through the dust bowl of the 30’s, long lines at the gas pump in the 70’s, and double-dip recessions in the 80’s. So what is nudging us toward different behavior this time around?

The FBI spends a great deal of time vetting agents who raise their hand for undercover work. Among the several qualities that the FBI places a high premium on in the hiring process is candor—honesty in our dealings and taking the blows where they land. It’s a matter of integrity. When I worked as an undercover agent, however, my first goal was to lie well enough to get close to the target of the investigation. Many agents just can’t pull it off because they find it too uncomfortable to act in a way that is inconsistent with their inner belief system.

This also explains why trash talk is suddenly working its way into the American lexicon. It’s too uncomfortable to think one way and then turn around and behave another. It’s the theory behind cognitive dissonance. Our attitudes about climate change, renewable resources, and conservation have changed over the years. As Mark Twain said, “Invest in land. They’re not making any more of it.”

Core belief systems about our role as responsible citizens of this planet are changing. We have an innate need to broadcast what we believe—by the way we dress, talk, and behave. We want our actions to be consistent with our beliefs. This is the nudge toward zero-waste that we’re feeling and it’s a powerfully persuasive tool. We all know how quickly a trend can quickly turn into a fad. The only way to sustain the movement, however, is to keep the conversation going—literally. Unless it soaks into all facets of our life, it risks becoming another fad that dates as quickly as orange shag carpet.

At the risk of losing all credibility with my readers, I want to let you know that I was one of those who found the split-personality aspect of undercover work to be a little too much like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. But even in the thick of things, I lied best when I lied believing in the rightness of the FBI’s role in the investigation. In the same way, as long as we continue to view our role on earth differently, it’s a trend that has a long tail.

Tags: Climate change, cognitive dissonance, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Recycling, zero-waste
Posted in Lifestyle, persuasion, Trends | No Comments »

Luxury, Trends, and Jif Peanut Butter

Saturday, October 10th, 2009

: Image by Getty Images via Daylife

On October 5^th, 2009 the publisher of Gourmet Magazine announced it will cease publication with the November issue. But Gourmet was always about more than just food; it was about a lavish lifestyle that seems on a downward spiral these days.

The magazine saw a 43% drop in advertising pages over the past year, according to Media Industry Newsletter. The reason? Gourmet relied upon travel and luxury advertisers that sold a lifestyle for the rich and famous. The recession has brought an entire generation of people to their senses. While filling out unemployment forms and looking for jobs, they’ve become tired of the voyeurism that has fed Americans for so many years and are suddenly yearning for a good dose of realism. We still have our action thriller movies and romance novels, but their escapism is childhood mixed with fantasy. Somehow, that’s acceptable in these days of stern economics. But frivolity is taking a hard hit. Instead of literary articles and posh advertisements, we’ve become more interested in feeding our families on a budget and keeping healthy. We’re buying more basic food products like peanut butter (Jif sales are up 39.8%) and ketchup (Heinz is up 967.1%) while air kissing goodbye to our fascination with costly gourmet meals.

The glamour bet is no longer paying off. And it’s not only with food magazines that offer a monthly rally for exotic travel, tips on where to stay, and what to eat while you’re there. The designers Viktor and Rolf recently appeared in Women’s Wear Daily holding a chainsaw and standing in front of a model wearing a freshly sheared tulle ball gown. Their theme was “credit crunch couture” and they promised to make buyers feel better about their extravagant prices by recycling their freshly cut tulle as a cost cutting measure.

The luxury market is not as powerful as it was in the 80’s, 90’s, and early 2000’s. During this time, luxury has been the signpost for the trend in upward mobility. There’s been a shift in attitudes and behavior, however, over the past year. Thrift and frugality have become virtuous qualities, and in the process, created a new trend: back-to-basics. And it’s resonating with consumers across all socioeconomic backgrounds.

A notice to luxury brands: a trend is a hard thing to beat back once it’s taken off. While every woman is going to be on the lookout for the newest handbag, buying a bargain makes her not only feel better about the purchase, it gives her bragging rights with friends. Frugal is suddenly as chic as black. Plus she still has the new handbag.

Trends are powerful because they have the ability to change our thinking. Not only about the things we purchase, but also about people, issues, and voting—to name a few. Sometimes we’re aware of trends, like wide ties, and other times we’re not, like the headline news stories that are selected by editors for us to read. Trends are a type of “shortcut” we take in our thinking because we have neither the time nor the energy to analyze every aspect of every person, event, or situation that comes to our attention. Our shortcut is this: if others are doing it, it must be OK. Every parent has heard that one before!

As an FBI agent, I learned how trends in crime could influence gangs and drive their criminal activities. As an FBI spokesperson, I quickly became aware of how a few media savvy individuals who claim to represent the majority can create trends in public opinion on a variety of topics while, in fact, representing only a small number of outspoken activists.

People are drawn to trends because they are drawn to herds.

When working counterintelligence cases, one of my first steps was to determine whether the target of my investigation traveled with the pack, or alone. Rarely did I ever attempt to recruit an individual if they surrounded themselves with a tight community of peers and colleagues. The reason is simple: herd animals move as a group. They circle the wagons and keep watch. I knew that I’d have little chance of luring the target out alone. That old adage is true: there really is safety in numbers!

Herds, and trends, are heavily influenced by what others think. The woman mentioned above who bought the new handbag on sale was rewarded not only with saving money, but also—and this is important—by the approval of her friends. A trend isn’t a trend unless others are doing it, too.

That’s why the back-to-basics trend will be powerful and hard to turn now that it’s gotten a foothold. For those who grew up with Jif peanut butter, it evokes quality, family values, nutrition, and most of all, a simpler lifestyle.