Consumer Cognition

Consumers care about the meta of products they buy, and more and more are asking questions like:

• where it came from, is it:
• local?
• national?
• foreign?
• who is responsible
• large corporations?
• small businesses?
• is the company paying/treating their employees fairly?
• what the impact of buying the product is
• environmentally?
• on my health?
• in my community?

Consumers are more cognizant about their choices and actually spend their money differently based on the information answered from these questions. Consumers are putting time into research because it has become so easy to do so on the internet. While we still look for the best possible deals (camelcamelcamel.com), we're becoming more discerning about what we buy and who we buy from.

Label Hell
There are all sorts of trends and movements like: "Shop local," "Buy Organic," "Sustainable [insert processes/products here]," "March Against Monsanto," "Third Wave Coffee," "Craft Beer," "Live Simply." While these movements are not exactly new, it's only recently where the marketing towards these movements is so incredibly important for companies - because now it's affecting their bottom dollar. It would be a challenge to go to a major grocery without seeing "Organic," "Fair-trade," "Eco-friendly," "Wild-caught," "Local," and so on. There are now a slew of new companies dedicated to providing products that meet these criteria. 

First World Problems?
Note that the questions mentioned above are not really about the product characteristics itself. We're not asking whether the product itself will satisfy our needs, because simply, that's a given. It's analogous the Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Are our basic needs met? "It's delicious, affordable, and fills my stomach - so yes." Okay, so then does the sales tax I pay for go back into my community? "Yes" And so on... We are definitely spoiled. We are capable of customizing most things about our lives and the image we want to give off to others. The act of choosing to experience as much as the world can offer, or at least what we choose to care about - is trendy. It's a bit hedonistic, but it can also make you interesting, ...cultured, ...inspired. And it doesn't have to be expensive or completely selfish. In fact, for example the alternative-culture trend of being thrifty is growing. Not to be confused with "Anti-Consumerism", this is actually more of a "Conscious Consumerism of Experiences" if I may coin such a term. To combine these practices with the growing conscience of consumers, I believe, shows that we're not just spoiled, but that we care.

Baby Boomers and Choice
I'm not going to get into why you should care or what criteria to care about specifically, but I will say that I have always been a believer in going out of my way to support a company that I trust and which satisfy the concerns I care about. This personal conviction is due in no small part to my parents. I hypothesize that like my parents' lives, baby boomers had easier lives than their parents before them. They were born into the new world of consumerism where multiple choices existed for anything you could possibly buy. Baby boomers helped pave the way to, in essence, being picky about what we spend our money on. Their specific reasons on their spending habits have only marginally been passed on, but more critical is the fact that the meta of buying decisions themselves were passed on. For me it's sort of similar to why one would get to know the owner of a small business. For some, it's for the simple social interaction alone, but I think there's a lot of us that like that feeling you get when you know someone on a first name basis from the community you live in. It makes you feel more involved with the community and you get to learn who and what your hard earned dollar supports. I'm not talking about the snobby patrons who need to judge whether or not their business is deserved - in other words someone who thinks their patronizing a business is a blessing unto them. I'd like to think it's more altruistic than that. Whether Baby boomers like it or not, some of the hippie trends and ideals permeated into their mainstream culture. Not long before them were the Bohemian ideals which today you might call hipsters, and certainly has similarities. You take a privileged and bored group of artistry socialites in any era and give them a bit of counter culture to chase and they end up gentrifying a poor neighborhood in pursuit of the arts and simple lifestyle. Creating gatherings like Woodstock and Burning Man, and creating social clubs of like-minded people. It can be a magnetic lifestyle that seems all figured out. It's reviled by some and adored by others. Yet, in subtle ways, the average atomic American family has a culture and ethos that has been influenced by these movements. Wanting to live for experiences as opposed to amassing material things. Wanting our children to be whatever they want to be when they grow up, as long as their happy. However, we being greedy creatures, we want to have our cake and eat it too. We pick and choose when it's convenient to pursue and appreciate the arts and crafts. America seems to despise hipsters and at the same time enjoy the finer things they "rediscover" and make popular again.

Meta-Cool!
Let's take our consumerism further into the meta. Why are some of these movements and trends seemingly polarizing? Why is anything polarizing? Well I think first of all, we're brought up in America to question everything. This is very academic, and it's a great way to experience life. It gives you a healthy level of skepticism, and helps you learn for yourself - rather than just taking things for granted. However, I think for many, even though it gives them that skepticism, they forget to do the hard research. So they take shortcuts by letting those they "trust" tell them what is or isn't true. It's a common logical fallacy most of us fall into when a celebrity endorses a product. They appeal to our emotion or respect or ignorance. They appeal to our desire to be correct on conclusions we've already made (Confirmation Bias). These appeals usually take place in issues that are complex, because most of us don't fully comprehend or are fully knowledgeable on a given complex issue. Let's take "Climate-change" for instance. Even after taking a college course in this very topic I still do not comprehend nor know every fact to fully argue the premise that humans are causing climate-change. So even with what knowledge I have, when there are strong views on either side I might feel like that they are unfounded. This makes it easy to disregard those with strong viewpoints in general - or maybe err on whatever side my friends have taken. I might see one "scientific" chart and base all my future beliefs on the subject from that, only to learn that the chart wasn't very scientific after all. In doing so, I might learn to be skeptical of all so claimed scientific studies from there on out - which actually might lead to an unhealthy amount of skepticism. Having an unusually high conditioned skepticism can actually leave you in an extreme position when someone presents you with new information. The same is true with being too gullible. The shortcuts we all naturally learn to use can hinder us, because we are no longer using critical thinking. Taking shortcuts means we no longer take the time to research the data and form a logical conclusion. Topics are polarizing because we use shortcuts.

Shortcuts, Lies, and Marketing
These shortcuts for decision making are what marketing companies use. They are paid to know our shortcuts, and even work to create and form our shortcuts for us. Mark a bag of chips with "Organic" and they know you will use your shortcut. You have already assumed a lot of information associated with that bag of chips. GMO-free, pesticide-free, sustainably produced, all-natural, healthier, environmentally friendly, etc., etc. Man! What a shortcut! How much of all those conclusions are true? Here's the problem. It's quite possible that none of those are true. It's also quite possible that all of those are true. There's a difference in the letter of the law between synthetic and natural pesticides, yet if an organic farm uses an extensive amount of natural pesticides, what's to say it's that any better? What makes it even harder (to find out the truth behind a particular product) is that a lot of these labels and certifications are very subjective. There are varying definitions you might have versus the companies certifying a particular consumable organic. Organizations that are accredited by the USDA can be foreign, private, or State run. Accreditation costs money, which means those farms getting certified must pay for it, and many do so only for the green-washing effect.. Enforcing both the accredited and the certified are daunting tasks, and not all those labeled Organic are truly so.  [Another link here] There are also a lot of buzzwords that aren't enforced, and could mean anything to nothing at all. [Another article going into the verification issues with these labels] Don't get me wrong, however, I buy most of my groceries Organic from Jimbos and Sprouts from local farms. I am mostly against huge industrialized farms, corn/soy subsidies, inhumane meat factories, and more due to my own research and beliefs. However, what I try not to do, is take labels for granted. I research the companies behind the brands I buy - and that's really what it comes down to. I've learned as a consumer, not to take things for granted, because I've been let down and misled before, and I don't like being swindled. I'd rather pay a premium for companies trying to pay their workers fairly, than save a a little bit buying from a large corporation who purposely turns a blind eye for profit. Therefore, it really bugs me when I find out I'm paying a premium for a product, but it ends up being falsely advertised/labeled and greenwashed anyways.  It's very tempting to only listen to, read, and remember the data that supports your desired conclusions. Which is why I do my due diligence in researching opposing views.

Think Critically
When I was a young elementary student, the most profound and memorable lessons my teachers taught were those of critical thinking. One lesson in particular was a trick question that didn't have all of the necessary facts to logically form a conclusion. To make sound conclusions is to draw information based off of data. Sometimes you need to gather that data yourself, and validate the data from multiple sources.  It's the same for journalists. Today there is an insane amount of editorializing on news channels and as well on the internet, but at its core journalist are only supposed to report facts. We need to sharpen the skill it takes to know how to separate opinion from fact. Part of this is keeping an open mind to new data and its sources and reevaluating past conclusions. Sometimes that means not forming an immediate opinion or conclusion because the sources are unreliable or the data is incomplete. Don't take an extremist approach to making conclusions, where passion precedes knowledge. Stay smart and make being a conscious consumer of experiences as rational as possible.