Buying In - (Page 6) 6 rob walker veyors about how we make decisions: We regularly claim that logos mean little or nothing to us. Those polled by GfK Roper Consulting on the subject of why they buy what they buy named “past experience” with a given brand, followed by quality, price, and “personal recommendations of others.” Only about a fifth were willing to cite branding as a factor at all. Another survey, focused specifically on apparel, suggested that most consumers had wised up to all the hype about new styles and trends and that a majority agreed that “fashion is less important to me than value and comfort.” Who could disagree? Of course you and I are more interested in rational concerns like “value and comfort” than on frivolous trends. “Buying a $5,000 handbag just because it’s a status symbol is a sign of weakness,” as one keen observer of branded culture put it. Who was that keen observer? Miuccia Prada, overseer of the famous luxury brand. (Presumably, buying a $5,000 Prada bag is okay, if you’re doing it for the right reasons— quality and value, for instance.) This summarizes the thinking of those who point to the emerging superdemanding new consumer. Like Homo economicus—“Economic Man,” the strictly rational cost/benefit maximizer of economic models—the new Consumer Economicus sorts through the explosion of available information and makes his or her best choice. Consumer Economicus is not swayed by branding, “status symbols,” or anything else that smacks of phony image making. Yet it’s hard to square this with the endless choices on view at Magic. There must be a million products here, ten million. Clearly there are differences in quality, materials, cut, form. But how many differences can there be? Shirts, pants, dresses, shoes. These are the essential tropes. Are there really so many
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