Trend Inflation and Cultural Suffocation: Can Brands Jump on Trends Without Squashing Them?
Culture is being suffocated.
Now, I don’t say this to be hyperbolic, but cultural trends are birthed faster than bunny rabbits and age like milk before they then perish, not even weeks later. Why is this, you ask? Well, let me explain why:
Trend inflation:
When a brand activates a trend at the right time, in the right way, it’s simply magnificent. The problem is, brands are getting far too efficient at snatching trends from their cultural incubator before they reach natural maturity, dragging them from niche to the mainstream.
With the rise of hyper-niche categorisation or “core-ification” of trends, like ‘Coastal Cowgirl core’ and ‘Grandpa core’, combined with arguably the most fleeting and fragmented media landscape we’ve ever seen, more microtrends are surfacing and with ever-shorter lifecycles. This inadvertently encourages brands to become more reactionary, which disrupts the should-be cyclical exchange between brand and culture.