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- [00:04]
A
My mom is. She's corner British.
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B
What about yourself? I can't tell.
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A
I. I mean, I'm 1 8, you know, so I'm still. I'm pretty watered down. Welcome to Hitmakers, How Brands Influence Culture, where every other week we explore cultural influence and how brands created.
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B
I'm Anna Angelic. I'm a brand executive, author and doctor of sociology. I write a newsletter, Sociology of Business, and I'm accompanied here by.
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A
I'm Reina Moto. I'm a creative entrepreneur and I'm a founding partner of a global innovation firm called Ayanco, based in New York, Tokyo and Singapore.
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B
And you guys cannot see her, but our producer, Vanya Arcernov is also always here making sure that we look and sound Great.
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A
Great. So we are talking about toys and mascots, aren't we?
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B
Let's do it.
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A
Yeah.
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B
Games.
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A
You have an interesting article recently in your. Speaking of your newsletter, the Sociology of Business, Peter Pan Effect. And I'm familiar with the Peter Pan syndrome. And I remember Peter Pan syndrome as a term when I was a kid in Japan in the 90s. And I looked up, actually, and the term Peter Pan syndrome was coined by a psychologist about grown up man, particularly. This is specifically said grown up man who refused to grow up. So I assume that, you know, you took Peter Pan effect from peanut button syndrome, but tell us about what you mean by Peterborough effect and what you observe is happening with toys, mascots and other, I guess, kids items, but in the world of brands.
- [01:57]
B
Absolutely. And I'm really glad you brought a Peter Pan effect up because it is a term from psychology. And in addition to the 90s, meaning, there was a not. I think every 20 years, as with all trends, it sort of happens that there was a gigantic, I think it was New York Magazine, New York Times article, maybe in the late 2000s that were. That was talking about how Gen X doesn't want to grow up. And then it was about millennials. So I think every generation sort of like goes through the Peter Pan phase. So now what I do think is I was not interested in like, oh, the world is scary, or we are nostalgic or we have anxiety and, you know, you just want to withdraw into your comfort of your childhood. No, I was looking from more the business and brand perspective and especially from brand perspective, which is why would you, as a brand, associate yourself with the mascot, invent a mascot, do board games or do toys, even if you're not Lego? Because a big part of my article is adult fans of Lego and how it's A big business. And so one thing is brands that are not in the toys business associating themselves with mascots like on did with Elmo.
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A
Yeah.
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B
And then the other part of that is how toy brands, because there are less and less children in the world, are reorienting themselves to marketing to adults. So what are your thoughts?
- [03:37]
A
Well, so I happen to come from a culture, Japanese culture, which is very comfortable with the idea of toys and these fictional imaginary friends being part of culture. So I mean, you know, growing up in Japan in the 80s, anime wasn't as big it is now globally. It was a very much isolated cultural IP in Japan. Right. And. But a lot of the cartoons and animes depict. Some of the animes were like realistic stories depicted as animes. But also some of the, those stories were the coexistence between real people and fictional characters. So for instance, and I don't know if you, if you know this, this anime called Doraemon, which is the dog digital. A cat. Cat.
- [04:33]
B
Ah, cat. Okay, the cat.
- [04:36]
A
Just for the context of the audience, Doraemon is this massive, massive franchise in, in Japan. And I think it started in the 60s or 70s. By the time I was a kid in the 80s, he was pretty major among Japanese kids. And it's this cat robot who has a magic pocket on his belly and he takes out out these super inventions out of his pocket to help this real kid character, a human being who's kind of a, a dropout. You know, he's this elementary school kid who's not popular among his friends. But you know, this kid befriends this cat robot and gains this superpower through that. So. But it's a combination of a real, I mean it's anime, but a real person and a fictional character coexisting in the real world. And, and something like that is very, very, very common and part of it. And it might, by the way, it might be kind of an interesting sociology study to do why in Japan this phenomenon of anime to begin with, but the coexistence of real world and the imaginary world being a very natural thing for many, many decades. Yeah. So now, and now having lived here for 25, 30 years or so, I see what I was used to 20, almost 30 years ago. And then even because I left Japan when I was 16. So. And after I left, like things like Pokemon, it was around when I was in Japan, but it wasn't as big. But now 20, 30 years later, it's a massive, massive global business and a lot of, you know, playful young brands, but also you know, like airlines, for instance, collaborating with Pokemon for. For their business. And then this coexistence between real and imaginary is something that again, 30 years ago didn't see a lot, but now I see outside of Japan. Japan quite a bit.
- [06:42]
B
It is. And then in my article I start with that for me less of a nostalgia and more of that AI induced.
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A
Yeah.
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B
Believe that nothing is real and we are sort of okay with that.
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A
Yeah.
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B
Like, you know what I mean? It's not exactly that we can tell what the scenery or like have you seen like I've seen recently those like fashion brand campaigns.
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A
Yeah.
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B
Look amazing. Or I don't know if you've seen like tennis courts around the world. None of them are real.
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A
Oh yeah. Yeah.
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B
This was like a few months back, maybe last fall or I don't know, maybe even six months ago. That was. But just, just the point is that we are visually enjoying whatever AI is creating without being like oh, that's not real. So I think it for us is more like how the. That unreality of content and different domains, but also that unreality of time. Because you know, why would things that were in our childhood stay in our childhood? Why wouldn't we put. I use the examples of. Of bag charms which are those little toys that women put on their like Louis Vuitton Hermes bag. It's basically that the time. I think we touched upon it in the last episode that basically you have just one time that is now. You know, there can be something from the past, something from the future, something from the present. And I think for me that's more like why does it mean that like you can't have a LEGO set and a. As an adult people now, they don't want to go out, they don't want to go clubbing or drinking. They have friends over and play board games. So that's kind of the mixture of behaviors that we enjoyed. But it doesn't matter at what age. So I think it's more that thing like that we are very comfortable in our imagination, so to speak. Which I don't think it's a bad thing at all.
- [08:35]
A
Yeah. I also think that because I think when we were in our teens or even younger, our parents, they were born say you know, a decade or within the first decade after the war. Right. And they didn't necessarily have the mask at least like in from my own upbringing by the time I was a. I was a kid, I was born in. In the 70s and 80s that the. The country of Japan has revived enough from the war to provide imagination or imaginary fictional world to kids. Whereas like my parents, I don't think they had as much of that when they were kids. So what I'm saying is that I think people like me grew up with, you know, like I remember like I was a big fan of Lego. And then in the 80s, Star wars came up, you know, and then, by the way, when I was a kid, there was no LEGO Star wars kits. They were just like basic ones. And then when I was in my 20s or even 30s, 25 years after the first Star wars came out, like those Star wars kits were introduced by Lego. So people like me in our 30s were like, holy cow, this is amazing. You know, I was 12 or I was 7 when the first Star wars movie came out. And so there was that kind of like nostalgia, but then, like we were able to live that again, but because we were just old enough to be able to experience this imaginary fictional world as kids. But they weren't as developed as it is now. And then now it's, it's, you know, I think you point out in your article, it's not quite nostalgia, but it's a different sort of dimension or different type of world that when we were kids then, you know, we didn't have it available, but now, like we can relive it, but we don't have to be be ashamed about, oh, you know, this is for kids versus this for those.
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B
I mean, this is important. I think what, what you just said is really important because there were previous generations have very strict behaviors. That's what they said. It's very linear or you're too old for that.
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A
Yeah, yeah.
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B
You know, as a like endeavor. And I think that now it's more like all bets are off.
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A
Yeah.
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B
In a sense. And that the past time no one is going to tell you like you, you know how there's like coloring books for adults and what's not. You know what I mean? You can do whatever you feel like doing. You know, you can pay bargains, you can make LEGO sets you can do. And I mean that's massive.
- [11:08]
A
Yeah.
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B
How much money Lego is making of adults. It's a big business.
- [11:14]
A
And you said like what, 20, 20%? 10%, 20%.
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B
I'm thinking same. And they didn't even do that maybe 15 years ago.
- [11:23]
A
Yeah, yeah.
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B
You know what I mean? That, that something became, I don't know, David Beckham was posting, they have like more than 70,000 subreddit and when you like I looked for a minute into Lego, I don't know if I wanted to write a case study or something and I wanted to listen to podcasts about Lego. Dude, do you know how many podcasts are that are not podcast?
- [11:46]
A
But no, I don't.
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B
Like people are just. It's, it's a hobby. It's. It's a passion point like any other. You can go shooting, you can go running or you can put Lego. You know, like it's just a hobby that is. So I think that there is that part that actually doesn't go away with childhood. Yeah, that hobby part, which I think that maybe now is a culture we are coming to terms or maybe in the past 20, 30 years or whatnot.
- [12:12]
A
Yeah, 30 years ago I think that culture just didn't exist because like no grown up would collect a toy. You know, like my parents at generation or even somebody who's, you know, 10, 20 years older than like my uncle. They would not collect, you know, they would collect things like, I don't know, watches or whatever. You know, things for grown up people. Yeah. Now it's perfectly acceptable for grownups to collect what used to be for kids toys that just didn't, didn't exist, you know, 25 years or you know, in the 80s and 90s when we honestly.
- [12:48]
B
Some of those Lego sets, like collectible ones that insanely expensive. Yeah, they're like collectibles and everything else. So I think that that's it. But the other thing that I want to touch upon, so one thing is like toys and how toy companies look at reallocating some of their resources towards adults. Because if business is there, more is going to come and that's where the marketing follows and so on. But the other thing is mascots and again, I think you're a perfect person to talk this about because I. Hello Kitty is Japanese and it was 50 years last year. But when you think about Mr. Clean, Ronald McDonald, KFC like, or even, even Elmo, and then the question is like, is this something we're going to see more of? Because human influencers, they get canceled, they age, they, you know, become. But like with something, someone like Elmo who's been around what, 50 years, 40 years.
- [13:46]
A
Yeah, yeah. For a long time. And he has. Yeah.
- [13:49]
B
You can't cancel Elmo, really.
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A
Right, right.
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B
Can you cancel Mr. Clean or Ralph Lauren Bear? I mean they haven't done anything, you know. Yeah, like so. Yeah, I'm curious.
- [14:00]
A
I mean they may be, you know, almost the hello kitties of the world. They may be a different kind of influencer celebrity. I mean, I'm sure they have quote unquote managers, but they don't have necessarily personality, you know, difficult personalities. What do you mean?
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B
Their account, they have Twitter account, they have Instagram.
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A
Oh, I see. I see. Yeah. Yeah.
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B
Especially in Japan, like, mascots are everywhere. Every town has a mascot and they. Every town has a mascot voice and so on. Yeah. Like in Japan, they're literally creating a thing around it.
- [14:35]
A
Yeah. Speaking of which, and just to expand on what you just said about every town or every region having a mascot, so. Yes, it's very true. Like, different towns and different prefectures have a mascot and usually they are used for tourism reasons. Right. To, and, and, and, or to sell souvenirs. But one of the mascots, which is a bear mascot that comes from the. The southern part of Japan and the name of the prefecture, literally translated, it's called the Origin of Bears. That's the name of the region. Yeah. Or the meaning of the. The, the region or the, the name. So actually it's a designer who created. Oh, you know what the name of the prefecture is. Origin of Bears. Why don't we create a bear mascot? Very simplistic sort of idea. But this mascot became huge and it's been around for almost two decades now. And it was, again, it was initially conceived as a way to represent the prefecture. But to your point, what's good about a mascot or a fictional character is that they don't age. So it's not like you have to get a new person when they get sick or they, they have a scandal or whatever, but it's always the same character. So in terms of, you know, brand consistency, it's. It's something that you can control and manage really well. Because they don't age. You can give whatever character personality you want that mascot to represent. So it is. I do think it's a very useful representation of a brand. And it happens in Japan. There are some of those that have stayed around and that, that have, you know, either like, like hello Kitty. It was, that was never. It was a. That was its own ip. Right. And then there are mask, like, you know, Elmo is its own IP Doraemon that I mentioned. It's its own IP. And then they are like Mr. Clean is a mascot for a brand. The bear character I just mentioned is a mascot for a region. Yeah.
- [16:45]
B
So those ones can be IPs. You know, like, they can be IPs.
- [16:49]
A
Yes.
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B
Like you have Geico Gecko. So you have Gekko from Geico.
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A
Yeah.
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B
Need Avengers in an ad.
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A
Right, right, right.
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B
Well, he's now IP separate from. I mean obviously he's never going to be or see or pay. They're never going to be separate from the brand from, from, from geico. But they have their own adventure in another ip. So I do think as the culture is moving towards more entertainment and that cross pollination of talent. Look at Elmo. From Sesame street to running perfectly encapsulates their brand message.
- [17:29]
A
Yeah.
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B
But it has nothing to do with Sesame Street.
- [17:32]
A
Yeah.
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B
So I do, I do agree with you but it just shows you the opportunities. Like you can imagine the Adventures of Mr. Clean.
- [17:38]
A
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [17:40]
B
In, in some world or you can. And then hello Kitty collaborates with gazillion brands.
- [17:46]
A
Yes. Yeah. Fashion brands, car brands. I mean so many brands. Yeah.
- [17:51]
B
Especially the 50th anniversary and, and then so on. So it's kind of. I just think that there is, that, that is actually what we are seeing because we are seeing brands going into entertainment and that gives advantage to those brands who already have their mascots.
- [18:07]
A
Yeah.
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B
And speaking of, have you noticed like how mascots get like a facelift? They get like update like Mr. Clean.
- [18:14]
A
Yeah.
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B
Used to be like this like crunchy, I guess middle aged.
- [18:19]
A
Yeah.
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B
Now he's like super buff, like 30 year old.
- [18:24]
A
Yeah.
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B
And then like when you see I saw the other day Polo Bear by Ralph Lauren. He's really chubby. They put him on Ozempic. Now it's like Skinny Bear. You need to see it's really find it. So I think like depending what's going on in society, those masks like if it's youth, if it's thinness and whatnot, they get a little like you know like reshuffle but, but then, then again that is that consistency. They're like cancellation through like.
- [18:54]
A
Yeah. So I think you know a couple of the example that you just mentioned like the bear or the, or Mr. Clean, those are existing mascots that have been around for quite some time.
- [19:06]
B
Yes.
- [19:06]
A
Right. And then the collaboration between let's say on an Elmo. Elmo is a character that's been around for a long time. Not associated with any. I'm sure you know they may have done any, any brand collaborations in the past but, but recently as far as I know. I don't think Sesame street or Elmo character specifically was associated with a major brand recently. Was it?
- [19:29]
B
I don't think Elmo was. I don't remember. But like you can, like we can Google. But like I don't, I don't remember any. But that doesn't mean you. But like now they like Sesame street unionized, so they cut characters out.
- [19:44]
A
Oh, no way.
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B
Yeah. This was from last week or something.
- [19:49]
A
No way.
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B
They're not the main ones.
- [19:52]
A
Sure, sure, sure. Yeah. You know, but they had to, they had to downsize. I know that's kind of sad.
- [19:58]
B
I mean. Yes, yeah. Well, anyway, so I don't like that is the whole thing. I think that like again when you. The same way that you have like fashion designers becoming customer first.
- [20:10]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [20:11]
B
Or movies, you have that cross pollination of talent in. Even in the domain of imaginary characters, cultural characters as human beings.
- [20:24]
A
I think one thing that I might say is a watch out for these collaborations or brands. I've noticed, I mean since you mentioned this topic a few weeks ago, I was looking around and there have been a few brands in the last couple years and I'm not going to mention who they are specifically, but they've, they've tried to create their own mascot and it's very difficult to create a mascot from scratch specifically to make that mascot commercial. Yeah.
- [20:56]
B
You see, I think the duolingo mascot worked.
- [20:59]
A
I, I think it worked. But I kind of think that like they were smart in that they were very gradual and organic in growing the mascot.
- [21:09]
B
You hear they, you can to that. Yes.
- [21:12]
A
Yeah. They didn't force, they didn't come up with a big campaign. Hey, you know, here's this character. He's this mascot. Right. Like they kind of, I think what they were smart was that they were experimenting with the social media and they just happened to have already this owl character as a mascot that they were using sort of in small ways almost like a clippy in Microsoft, you know, world long time ago.
- [21:35]
B
Yeah, you're right.
- [21:36]
A
And then they started experimenting it and it started to, to gain traction and then they made a bigger deal out of it as opposed to hey, here's our mascot representing brand X or whatever. Yeah. And I think that's sort of a danger that, that I've also seen not a lot of cases, but a few cases that, that I saw that you know, there was like a press release some, some company put out for a new mascot that they, they introduced and then six months later nobody's talking about it, you know.
- [22:02]
B
Right. Because you can't like mascots came from sports and they came for. That was their like social thing that sports like teams that sports fans like identify with and organize around it like that they kind of symbolize that belonging and that shared passion. So you need to have those projections that is basically you need to lend your Identity or identity that group to the mascot. And it makes sense only when that happens. And that happens years, years, decades over time. You know, like, you know how NFL clubs, they have like, Eagles, Bengali Tigers, so on. But that's years and years and years. And you have. In the European soccer, you have mascots and so on.
- [22:47]
A
Yeah.
- [22:48]
B
So it does take. And like, another thing that I want to say, like, mislemel looked like, damn scary back in the day.
- [22:56]
A
Yes.
- [22:57]
B
So creepy. You know, until they. Because it was like, whoa, science experiment.
- [23:02]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [23:02]
B
And then also mascots d die. Like, Mr. Peanut was killed and there was a baby. You know what I mean? So I think you're just scratching the surface in terms of narrative possibilities, because the narrative world is created the easiest when you have a character and their adventure. Like, look, Barbie movie, Barbie and fashion, you know, like, so it's kind of when you have that you already have an anchor in a sense, like, where do they live, what do they do? Who do they know? And so on.
- [23:30]
A
Speaking of Barbie, another dimension of this conversation that I. That just piqued my interest and I will mention, is there's the mascot aspect of this conversation. The other dimension, I think, is the merging or the fusion between real and imaginary. So Barbie movie, what I found, I mean, I'm not by any means a Barbie fan, but I did enjoy the movie quite a bit. And what I didn't know until I watched the movie was that they did a really good job fusing what is fictional and imaginary and what is real and how, you know, Bobby and Ken came to the real world and interacted with real people. And the reason why I bring that aspect of this conversation up is that and something that you and I talked about quite a While ago, how McDonald's did this was like an activation campaign maybe sometime last year, almost six, eight, nine months ago, where they took a cultural anime meme and then replicated in the real world. And I thought that was really culturally insightful because what they did was they took what's called McDonald's so m upside down w McDonald's. And McDonald's in the gaming world is the McDonald's, but in the gaming world. So a lot of game designers and gamers, you know, put the other w upside upside down and they. They refer to McDonald's as McDonald's. And then what McDonald's did was take that and made a real McDonald's I think, somewhere in LA. And what they served in the. In the Wackdano's restaurant was, you know, stuff from the. The Gaming world. So kind of like the blurring of the lines between what's virtual and imaginary and then bringing into the real world. And what was interesting about Elmo is that one aspect is this iconic mascot, but also the fact that imaginary character like Elmo talking with a real person, Roger Federer, and then having that dialogue in the real, you know, in a commercial. I mean, they do that in episodes all the time, obviously, but it's. It's. It's sort of a. I feel like a new thing that over the last couple years and that. That you haven't seen a lot of.
- [25:55]
B
Tolerance that's, I think, created by AI. That was my first thing because I was like. When I wanted to write that article, I was like, I don't want it to be about nostalgia. I don't think it is. I don't know what it is. I don't know what it is. And then I was like, oh, it's actually the fact that we are much more tolerant about this one continuum of reality that's not just physical, but it's online and offline are one thing. And then what you have that culture. It's online and off, like, culture. Because before you had, like, Burger King, the King.
- [26:25]
A
Yeah.
- [26:26]
B
And Crispin was shooting, like, you know, their ads, and then the King was running away from fans, and the King's one would fall and something.
- [26:35]
A
Yeah, that one. That one. I feel like what Bourbon King was doing 10 years ago and what I would say Liquid Death is doing now is it's a fictional thing, but it stays in. Stays in the fictional world. Right. What you are talking about, what we are talking about here is the blurring of the two. Yeah. Speaking of which, did you listen to this New York Times daily episode about a married woman falling in love with a chatbot man?
- [27:10]
B
No, but is that like. Was that like the Spike Lee movie her. Oh, he was a Spike Jones with Samantha.
- [27:19]
A
This one was. Was kind of different in that. This may go in a different tangent, but it just reminded me. So a married woman, and she. Her relationship with her husband was totally fine, or mostly fine, I guess. Yeah. And then she was openly. She was telling her husband that she was doing this. And then I can see part of it was like a journalism thing. So she was being recorded at the same time. So she knew that this was being recorded and making it known to her husband, but at the same time, she was having this very romantic conversation with. With that. With a boyfriend, essentially. And then the husband was fine. Oh, you know, this is just a fictional thing.
- [28:09]
B
She Said until and then.
- [28:12]
A
I mean she was even like crying about this relationship with this virtual being. And I'm like, what's happening in Japan, Jay? Yeah, I mean it's been happening, dude. It's been happening for like decades in Japan.
- [28:27]
B
It's been happening for a couple decades, honestly. Like I'll put a little Asterix there. All right, before we wrap this conversation because I'm mindful of time time, I also want to talk about one thing, okay. Quid game which is using kids games, boy characters and it's inverting them in something insanely scary. So one thing is we talked about a couple of episodes ago why, you know, the first, first season was amazing. The second season was okay. But now that we're talking about toys and mascots, like starting from the first one, a very popular character that's then suiting people like laser eyes basically to all those other innocent kids games are turned into something so scary and crazy and dystopian. So what are your thoughts on that?
- [29:22]
A
I think what was really unexpected about that is just a juxtaposition between something so mundane and something so playful and even soft like a lot of people have and particularly people in Korea who grew up playing those games. And like in Japan, you know, we had similar, different but similar games, right. And like I do remember the red light, green light thing. We had a different version of it in Japan and growing up with it in Japan and I could imagine very easily how disorienting what I used to play as a kid, as an 80 year old or 7 year old can be used to murder people. And that just extreme juxtaposition, it was unexpected.
- [30:15]
B
Well, I think that's the, that's my question is why is so creepy to have something that's so innocent and naive becomes so murderous? I guess because it's unexpected or is there anything else or because it's so innocent?
- [30:30]
A
Again, I think it's just the complete sort of up like 180 degrees the other direction. You know, it's not just taking something that is here and then just adding a little bit of twist to give it a different meaning or what have you. But it's giving 180 turning into its subverting. I think it's the extremism of a simple innocent idea taken to the other extreme. That was, that was unexpected. And I give them, especially the first time that they did it, I give them credit for that. Create that kind of creative, unexpected thinking perhaps that was, you know, like you and I talked about was missing in the second episode was that taking something that's so. Either innocent or so mundane or so normal and then giving a 180 degree interpretation.
- [31:21]
B
They did the same thing. It's just that we are already used to it. We knew the catch first time. We didn't know the catch.
- [31:28]
A
No, no, that's why, that's why like the first time was much more captivating. And then that was. What I'm saying is that was missing from the second one is that I think, I think we were subconsciously expecting. What's that? You know, when we watch stories, when we watch drama series, when we watch movies, we are subconsciously looking for that surprise or like when there's a surprise, then we are and especially we are, you know, impressed by or whatever.
- [31:54]
B
Yeah. We, you know, that becomes a catch this time. But also like at a similar time when there was. There was Queen's Gambit and again so that's a board game, you know. And then like the way like just to maybe summarize all of this before going into Hit List is basically saying like one is the business and the economic reality in that like oh, there are less and less kids born in the world, especially Korea and Asia, Europe, US So let's say, you know, and in that sense toy companies are reshuffling to a new market. Number one. Number two, the like that imaginary layer of storytelling.
- [32:38]
A
Yeah.
- [32:38]
B
Is basically our creative canvas is expanded and I think that's powered by AI in the past or super powered.
- [32:47]
A
Yeah.
- [32:47]
B
And then the next level is that board games as a pastime. And then the final layer for me is play. Play as itself. That has rules and regulations and how some brands are building the entire rules of the like the play around them. Like for example for me, Thom Brown or Hermes in fashion they have a consistent world. But you can also say that McDonald's may be building one. You can also say that Duolingo maybe building one. Basically when the tone of voice with the color palette, with the, you know, you create everything around it. Geico has one is kind of like. And basically people themselves became. Become mascots.
- [33:33]
A
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, interesting topic. Should we go to hey list?
- [33:37]
B
Absolutely. So do you want to go first?
- [33:41]
A
You go first. You go first.
- [33:42]
B
I go first. I have tools. So my first one is that I read the other day in New York Times article how Gen Z is tired of trends. Because then like because TikTok everything lasts for really short period of time. But the problem is not that it's just short period of time. It's is that is connected with consumption of physical things.
- [34:02]
A
Yeah.
- [34:02]
B
So you need to be either vanilla girl or a coastal grandma or dark academia or what's not. But those trends change like very fast. And just the moment you buy things to have a look, almost becoming a mascot for that trend, it changes. And then the like the kids are like wait, this is gross, I don't want to participate in this. I'm going to buy durable things. And then non trend became a trend. So you can't escape the algorithm in, in a sense. But I do think it's mega relevant because trend is showing one's cultural currency and cultural capital for brands and for consumers. And that is going to then change the dynamic between brands and consumers. If consumers are like you're not following trends anymore. And if brands are like what are they going to do if you're a CPG brand, a fashion brand. But it's not just fashion, this is also gaming. It's either Zelda or I wrote these down hell divers or like it really what is fashionable, what is trendy, which video games to play but then changes faster and faster and faster. So at some point it's not going to be a viable business and brand strategy for brands to do that. It's not going to be a viable economic behavior for consumers to do it.
- [35:24]
A
So I have two topics that I was thinking about. One is this sounds a little random but related to something that we talked about today, but also just in general is the role of cities in culture and trends. And what I mean by that is I was listening to actually an economics podcast and it was saying that people are leaving cities and in the US states like New York and California because it's become too expensive to live in those places. Right. What I'm curious about is what impact it would have on culture and like cities like London, New York, Los Angeles, Tokyo, Paris, who were and to some extent still considered to be the cultural centers or at least like the mega epicenters of global culture. If young people like I'm able to live in New York City because I'm a middle aged man and making this amount of money and can afford to live. But I can't imagine me 23, I mean when I first moved to 23 year old, I mean this is 25 years ago and I, I had to live with my brother, we had to be roommates because we had, we couldn't afford to live by ourselves. And back then too, you know, everybody had a, had a roommate. But even if I were living with my brother when you know if I'm 23 today, like, I can't imagine how difficult it would be for 23, 24, 25, even 27 year olds to live in New York City. So if that's what's happening today in New York City, what's happening to culture and trends that I thought 20 years ago were coming from big cities, you know, is it. Has it just moved online? Is that the, the place? Or like what's the interaction between local places versus, you know, online cultures and how they germinate each other to become culture?
- [37:40]
B
I think that's very like. So at the same time, New York doesn't lack young people. When you go out, there is a town and Brian and I look at my husband and I, we are like, how can these people afford to be.
- [37:56]
A
Yeah, no, yeah.
- [37:57]
B
And they're like. There was a recent news magazine article about how parents are subsidizing and basically. Because you can't make enough money when you're 23, 25. Basically.
- [38:09]
A
Yeah. Yeah.
- [38:10]
B
Not just live, but to actually go out because you look in a dinner is like 100 per person. So 200 and then.
- [38:16]
A
Yeah, easily.
- [38:18]
B
So in, in. In any scenario, it's, it's expensive not just to live to God, but still there's so many young people like it. It's not that they're like as you say, oh, but it's kind of like older people now. This is aging city. There is not new things coming. It's still very young.
- [38:37]
A
Yeah.
- [38:39]
B
So I think it's a complexity of intergenerational dynamic. I would say as well that parents support their children way longer than before.
- [38:49]
A
They have to. Yeah.
- [38:50]
B
Because both of us lived with our. I lived with my brother as well when I moved to US and it was less of a parent support and more of, you know.
- [39:01]
A
Yeah.
- [39:02]
B
You know. So I think that dynamic should be also looked into. And second thing is, which leads me to my second one is people travel way more. So even if you don't necessarily live in New York, you take a flight 55 times a day and you can easily access it.
- [39:21]
A
Yeah.
- [39:21]
B
So that's called like there was a tweet the other day that they saw. It's called Affluenza. Like it's, it's a contagion of affluence. So everyone, everyone, a big majority of people population is affluent enough to fly frequently to fly tiny destinations from Santa Barbara to San Francisco, half an hour flight and then to expect to be in the lounge, which are like lounges are super crowded. Yeah.
- [39:51]
A
Yeah. Oh, yeah.
- [39:51]
B
Expect to like board first and so on. Those expectations of kind of rich and like, of being rich.
- [40:02]
A
Yeah.
- [40:02]
B
And it just become very crowded. Yeah, no, it definitely in that sort of area when people are one person, like, if they're not even 1%, it's like. Yeah, there is a lot of 1 percenters.
- [40:14]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [40:15]
B
Who know. And with those expectations that come. Oh, the privacy, the service, the experience and so on and that become mess. Mustiche.
- [40:26]
A
Yeah.
- [40:26]
B
You know, they're like flying to Zermatt. They're like, I think like, that is one thing that actually, that mobility, that flying really allowed people, oh, I'm gonna live in Nashville and I'll come once a month to New York or like.
- [40:40]
A
Live upstate New York and come to New York every 2 million people.
- [40:43]
B
Like, I know so many. Like, you know what I mean? But even if you wanna say they, they're going to second tier city because, I don't know, it's more affordable in schools and so on, blah, blah, you still have like easy access.
- [40:55]
A
Cool.
- [40:56]
B
What's the second one?
- [40:57]
A
Oh, so the other, the other thing, it's more. Less of what I think should is happening, but what should be happening is C suites should have. Should hire more interns.
- [41:09]
B
I see.
- [41:10]
A
The reason why I say it is I think young people can have more power. Like, when I was 21, I didn't have any power. Right. But now young people can have more power than I used to when I was 21, 22. And in terms of. You're shaking your head. Not everybody. Not everybody.
- [41:32]
B
No, no, no, no, no. I, I agree with you, Actually, I do.
- [41:36]
A
Okay.
- [41:36]
B
I was. No, no, no, I was, I was like making face because. Yeah, I was thinking about millennials. Not Gen Z. Gen Z is very different than millennials. And I was Millennials. Like, they're horror stories. Like, I'm happy to share, but, like, go finish your argument. Yes.
- [41:53]
A
Yeah. So the, the reason why I thought about it is I just happened to be browsing through Instagram and my friend who has a, A cp, you know, food, Food company, she, She's a. One of the founders, she said, oh, you know, meet our new intern. And this intern, I don't, I don't remember her name, but this young looking individual, I just happened to click on this person's profile and she's got 500,000 followers. Yeah. And I was talking to another person who's in his 60s, and by the way, this person is very, like, culturally aware, culturally relevant individual, and he was talking about a college graduate that he hired recently, you know, maybe two years ago. But what's important about that conversation was that he actually works with that individual directly as opposed to like hiring an intern and letting like, you know, third layer down manage the interns. But he like actively engages what they're interested in, what they're doing and let them like participate in meetings. Yes. And that. So like those two examples, those are like very isolated examples, but I think, see, and then like the executives that I talk to, some of them are just so removed from the day to day. They're smart from a business perspective, but like what's happening on the ground, like completely detached.
- [43:24]
B
So I agree with that.
- [43:25]
A
I agree with hiring more interns and working directly with those interns.
- [43:29]
B
Chance that. And honestly, I work only with 20 something year olds now for like creative strategy for. Because you like, the best ideas come. And they're like. And also they, they're more like self sustainable, independent.
- [43:44]
A
Yeah.
- [43:44]
B
Than millennials were, you know, like, remember millennials? Like, I was just like, I know you're running out of time, but like my favorite body was like, oh. Like when I was told, when I was chief brand officer and one of them companies that I was told by a millennial social media manager, it would be really helpful if you wrote that down for her.
- [44:06]
A
Oh, man.
- [44:08]
B
So Gen Z, they're like, not like that. They're like, you can breathe them, they run with it. They work over the week. They like, at least that's my experience. And millennials were way more spoiled. Yeah. Like, I was telling her what to do and she's like, it would be really helpful if you wrote that down.
- [44:22]
A
If you're not. Oh man. You are told off.
- [44:25]
B
So, you know, like, so. But I totally get what you're saying and I think that's. I think you should suggest to your clients, thousand percent.
- [44:32]
A
Yes. Yes, we do. All right. With that. I think that's a wrap.
- [44:36]
B
So that's a wrap of episode 11. Thanks everyone for listening and follow us on YouTube, Apple, podcasts, Spotify, and thanks again to our producer, Vanya Arsenov. And as always, thank you, Ray, for amazing.
- [44:50]
A
That was fun. All right.
- [44:51]
B
Always.
- [44:52]
A
Ciao. Bye.