Chapter 1
Consumption Individuals / groups acquiring, using and disposing products, services, ideas or experiences.
▪ Globalization / growth of trade is a key element in the development of consumption.
▪ Locavores: movement aiming to connect food producers and consumers in the same
geographic region, aiming to develop a more self-reliant and resilient food network.
▪ Inappropriate consumption: not-ethically consuming.
▪ Industrial revolution: marketing, shopping malls, mass productions, season collections
arise (let people buy more then they need).
▪ Conspicuous consumption (Thornstein): the purchasing of luxury items to publicly
display wealth to enhance identity and/or prestige.
• Conspicuous time consumption: when busyness, lack of leisure time becomes a
status symbol.
• Chinese consumer groups:
1. Luxury newcomers: brand-conscious 70%
2. Status surfers: not brand loyal
3. Luxury connoisseurs: higher income /family money, more sophisticated
in purchasing;
4. Fearless young spenders: prefer trending over branded products.
▪ Higher accessibility of goods:
• Department stores arose around 1830;
• Catalogue shopping in US around 1900 (low population density);
• Self-service supermarkets (not asking assistant and impulse buying encouraging)
1930’s;
• Recent popular ways: pop-up stores (realize urgency), vending machines.
1. Consumerism Important because it illustrates the development of the active consumer, laying the ground for
the rise of consumer rights organizations, equality of access and opportunity and the
introduction of consumer protection legislation.
▪ Consumer sovereignty: represents exercise of freedom that people could have through
consumption.
▪ Consumer’s rights became (40’s onwards) more protected by government, organizations
due to activism and awareness, now same rise but for climate protection.
▪ Sustainable development goals: fight inequalities and tackle climate change.
2. Postmodern Emerged from consumerist movement, reflecting the varied ways that consumers value
consumer consumption and how they explore different identities through consumption: breaking down
the divide between consumer and production, realizing co-creation of value (consumer also
helps in production through creating products / connecting with the brand).
▪ Fragmented nature: postmodern consumers want to explore different and separate identities
to match fragmenting markets and proliferation of products (i.o. a unified persona).
▪ Marx: Exchange value: represents what value of a good is to the consumer and therefore
what it should be exchanged for, usually it’s price.
• Postmodernism: consumers use goods to create and manage their identities, trading at
▪ Use value: the value of a good to the consumer in terms of usefulness it provides.
• EX: when something is too expensive → exchange value > use value
• Now, sign value: symbolic meaning the consumer attaches to goods to construct and
participate in the social worlds.
3. Experiental Emerged in 1980’s, based upon ideas from postmodern consumerism, sees consumer as
consumption experience-seeker highlighting multisensorial nature of consumption feeding the consumers
feelings, hedonic and sensory focus (not rational-decision maker).
4. Consumer culture Takes experiental consumerism further but within wider social, historical and cultural world
theory context, with 4 main strands of research:
Consumption Individuals / groups acquiring, using and disposing products, services, ideas or experiences.
▪ Globalization / growth of trade is a key element in the development of consumption.
▪ Locavores: movement aiming to connect food producers and consumers in the same
geographic region, aiming to develop a more self-reliant and resilient food network.
▪ Inappropriate consumption: not-ethically consuming.
▪ Industrial revolution: marketing, shopping malls, mass productions, season collections
arise (let people buy more then they need).
▪ Conspicuous consumption (Thornstein): the purchasing of luxury items to publicly
display wealth to enhance identity and/or prestige.
• Conspicuous time consumption: when busyness, lack of leisure time becomes a
status symbol.
• Chinese consumer groups:
1. Luxury newcomers: brand-conscious 70%
2. Status surfers: not brand loyal
3. Luxury connoisseurs: higher income /family money, more sophisticated
in purchasing;
4. Fearless young spenders: prefer trending over branded products.
▪ Higher accessibility of goods:
• Department stores arose around 1830;
• Catalogue shopping in US around 1900 (low population density);
• Self-service supermarkets (not asking assistant and impulse buying encouraging)
1930’s;
• Recent popular ways: pop-up stores (realize urgency), vending machines.
1. Consumerism Important because it illustrates the development of the active consumer, laying the ground for
the rise of consumer rights organizations, equality of access and opportunity and the
introduction of consumer protection legislation.
▪ Consumer sovereignty: represents exercise of freedom that people could have through
consumption.
▪ Consumer’s rights became (40’s onwards) more protected by government, organizations
due to activism and awareness, now same rise but for climate protection.
▪ Sustainable development goals: fight inequalities and tackle climate change.
2. Postmodern Emerged from consumerist movement, reflecting the varied ways that consumers value
consumer consumption and how they explore different identities through consumption: breaking down
the divide between consumer and production, realizing co-creation of value (consumer also
helps in production through creating products / connecting with the brand).
▪ Fragmented nature: postmodern consumers want to explore different and separate identities
to match fragmenting markets and proliferation of products (i.o. a unified persona).
▪ Marx: Exchange value: represents what value of a good is to the consumer and therefore
what it should be exchanged for, usually it’s price.
• Postmodernism: consumers use goods to create and manage their identities, trading at
▪ Use value: the value of a good to the consumer in terms of usefulness it provides.
• EX: when something is too expensive → exchange value > use value
• Now, sign value: symbolic meaning the consumer attaches to goods to construct and
participate in the social worlds.
3. Experiental Emerged in 1980’s, based upon ideas from postmodern consumerism, sees consumer as
consumption experience-seeker highlighting multisensorial nature of consumption feeding the consumers
feelings, hedonic and sensory focus (not rational-decision maker).
4. Consumer culture Takes experiental consumerism further but within wider social, historical and cultural world
theory context, with 4 main strands of research:
