(F)LUXURY
Luxury. Is it a family of six? Owning a SUB instead of a SUV? Needing nothing at all? You decide.
This year, luxury, and what it means to a bewildering number of ‘consumer segments’, will remain in flux.
So how will luxury brands fare over the next 12 months? What will define luxury over the next few years? The answer is ‘luxury will be whatever you want it to be’. After all, what constitutes luxury is closely related to what constitutes scarcity. And, beyond the basic needs, scarcity is in the eye of the beholder, especially those beholders who are desperately trying to be unique. Now that there are so many more ways to be unique than just buy the biggest and the most expensive, how about luxury constituting:
Anything commissioned? Providing ‘access’? Secrets? Stories? Time with one’s loved ones? Time for oneself? All things local? Peace and quiet, if not escape? Eco-friendly? Human-friendly? Animal-friendly? Caring? Empathy? Perks? Craft? Friends? Having a larger-than-life perspective? Households of six or more? An audience? Eccentricity? Appointment-only? Relevant information? Extreme personalization? Not having or wanting to consume? Being opinionated? Anything premium? Fuck-you money? Curation if not the absence of any kind of choice? Philanthropy? Bespoke goods and services? Knowledge? Skills? Frugality? Health? Etiquette & manners? Or a mix of any of these?
So don’t worry about missing out on the next big thing in luxury, focus on defining it. How? By finding and coining the right (status) trigger for the right audience. Just declare that the end is nigh for anything that’s getting a little too affordable, too accessible, too polluting, or just too well-known. Then introduce something very different (if not the opposite), appealing to the in-crowds who are ready to jump ship anyway ;-)
P.S. We’re not saying ‘traditional’ luxury is going to disappear. Case in point: LIMITED LOCATIONS, a (F)LUXURY sub-trend that ties in nicely with aforementioned URBAN PRIDE:
LIMITED LOCATIONS
We know you all know about limited editions as an enduring luxury-strategy; it is an easy way to appeal to consumers’ need for exclusivity and scarcity, amidst a ‘Sea of Sameness’. So why not introduce LIMITED LOCATIONS to extend the scarcity theme to the distribution channel?
This year, just sell something special, something premium, something desirable in just one (geographical) location. Which means forgoing a chain-wide rollout or selling to all from a borderless e-shop. The limitation this will put on distribution opportunities will be compensated for by enthusiasm, PR and premium prices.
For shoppers, it brings back the thrill of (literally) having to go places to pick up something for others or themselves. Think about it, what better cure for retail blandness than to turn a Stockholm or Istanbul flagship store into a true destination again? Or what if every one of your stores/outlets/venues had its own unique experience and assortment?
Like aforementioned URBAN PRIDE, turning locations into destinations is something that will mainly benefit bigger brands, helping them become less cookie-cutter, less bland, as niche brands almost practice LIMITED LOCATIONS by default.
Examples from brands already having fun with LIMITED LOCATIONS:
- Fashion brand Bape sells some of its limited edition lines only in stores in the Kagoshima, Harajuku, Nagoya and Matsuyama regions of Tokyo.
- Burberry’s Blue Label is a line of Burberry stores exclusive to Japan that features a more fitted, sassier version of Burberry styles.
- Le Labo fragrances, with fragrance boutiques in New York, LA and Tokyo, and mini-shops in department stores in cities like London, Las Vegas and Berlin, produces an exclusive scent for each major city it sells in, restricting the fragrance’s availability to that city alone.
- At Heathrow’s Terminal 5, a number of brands have designed exclusive products for their airside stores. Travelers can purchase a range of one-off items, including a pendant from Bulgari, a silver model of the terminal itself from Links of London, and an exclusive Krispy Kreme T5 doughnut.
