It’s only at times like these that we can look back, a week on, and start to evaluate the horrific and mindless acts of earlier this month, when the streets of Liverpool, Birmingham, London and a number of other city centres were taken over by fighting, arson, and most notably looting.
We aren’t going to get involved in the ‘whys and wherefores’ of last week’s events, but it quickly broke down into something far from rioting. We all witnessed a string of events that can only be described as opportunistic looting, where stores were targeted, whilst the streets were empty, and groups of people took the time to select shops, and roamed the aisles looking for products they wanted, sometimes taking the time to grab a trolley to help with their booty!
What stood out for us though was that when high streets were on shut-down, and the looting continued, when time was of the essence, there were stores that were ‘chosen’ to be stolen from.
Brands and products have become so important to society, that even when community breaks down and the town is effectively under siege, looting isn’t a hap hazard attack, at whatever store is in reach. The teenagers and young adults of last week selected their targets and did whatever they could to take from aspirational stores.
The main stores that were hit in most towns were JD Sports, Foot Locker, and various stores where electrical items can be found.
So what is it that drives people in this situation to ‘choose’ in this way? They aren’t teaching the stores a lesson, in the way that the last few century’s looters stole offensive paintings or political books. They are simply selecting stores that mean the most to them, and give them the best opportunity to increase their life’s enjoyment. Whilst its obvious from a quick look on eBay that excess products from the lootings have been put on sale (simply search eBay for trainers or Apple computers for examples of a plethora of recent uploads!), essentially the majority of products were personally selected based on the looters personal preference! As per the picture below, checking the brand and shoe size!
Brands have been hit in amazingly consistent patterns across the country – Xbox, Nike, Adidas, Apple, Sony. These are aspirational brands. Brands that you associate with wealth, and stature in communities and amongst youth culture, and brands that give them the opportunity to lift their status.
You could argue that a lot of the looting wasn’t even ‘value’ related. Clearly people were entering stores and taking specific items, and not based on cost. If that was the case, surely looters would have targeted Chelsea and Kensington, and Harrods would have been emptied by day 2. These people were ripping open shutters, sometimes taking 15 minutes of brute force and effort, to take out an Xbox and games – the online gaming brand of the decade. They were trashing an O2 store to take out an iPhone – the brand of our generation. JD Sports found that Nike and Adidas shoes and tops were taken, and barely any others – the brand choices of football and rap stars. But these are products the younger generations already have, surely?? We heard how Blackberry messaging and Facebook statuses were used to communicate rioting. These require Blackberries and Android phones – not cheap items.
Products of the 21st Century have taken on their own persona. There has always been a fashion or trend to attain items of value. Ever since the high street and the retail economy truly started in the mid 18th Century, valuable items were always the goods we stared at through the shop window. Jewellery, vehicles, furniture. However, how many car dealerships, jewellers or furniture stores were actually stolen from last week in the looting?
Products’ attraction has changed. People no longer look to items of extreme value. There is a mid-level of aspiration where the items we see every day in most of our homes are the foundation of our desire. We already have an iPhone, but we’d like the next one, not a better phone. We already have Nike trainers, but we want the latest pair of Nikes, not better ones. We already have an Xbox. We don’t want a better more expensive console (as the Playstation 3′s launch can testify to), we just want more games for the Xbox. We are collecting items, and purchasing items to give us respect. Looters chose brands, subliminally, that gave them more of the same things that they already had. More trainers, more electrical devices, more games, more phones.
The brands that famous people link themselves to (or are paid to link themselves to) project to younger people the values of health and happiness and a ‘cool’ status that they want. A level of respect that the famous people achieve because of their success in their sport or industry. By attaining these products they hope to cheat the system, and gain success and respect by the things they have and not the things they do. That somehow the brand will act as a success-conductor!
It’s a strange phenomenon that companies are only just realising. Decades of advertising has linked famous people to products, but with the advent of Facebook, Twitter, Blogs, and more invasion into celebrity lives through the press, we are seeing very frequently what these famous people genuinely buy and use, and are paid to use.
A famous person advertises Tesco but gets seen shopping in Waitrose, and the press have a field day: the stars have to sign-up in a deeper sense, to ensure we are ‘tricked’ into the mind-set that these brands and products are truly a part of their life. We believe that a product needs to be designed and deeply thought through to solve a problem. Every step of the process needs to be assessed, to ensure it fulfils the need, but without the right packaging, and branding, and total message you will fall short in today’s retail environment.
Last week’s looting if nothing else goes to prove that the brands are the final critical link in the product design chain. Get a product right, and you are on the route to success, but package it and promote it successfully and you’ll be printing money. Imagine what thoughts would go through the Marketing Manager of Reebok’s mind, seeing Adidas’ and Nike’s shelves empty, and their products mostly untouched, amongst the aisles of JD Sports. Relief? Or envy?
