Consumers & Brands
Changes in consumer agency, identity narratives, and brand relationships—and how brands can rebuild reasons to buy.
15 essaysCore questions in this topic
- Why do consumers increasingly reject brand-defined identities?
- How does changing agency reshape consumption and identity?
- How can brands turn a new narrative into product and organizational action?
Consumers Aren't Just 'Treating Themselves' — They're Reclaiming the Right to Define Who They Are
Today's shift in consumption is not merely about self-indulgence: consumers are using choices, experiences, and narratives to take back the right to define their own identity.
How to Build New Reasons to Buy in the Age of Consumption Saturation
Once functional needs are saturated, how brands can create new reasons to buy from pain, fear, delight, itch, and the hidden frustrations consumers live with daily without noticing.
When Consumers Have the Final Say, What Should Brands Actually Do?
When consumers hold the power to interpret, to choose, and to walk away, brands must turn their new narrative into products, channels, incentives, and organizational action.
It's Not That Products Stopped Selling — Consumers No Longer Accept Being Defined
The consumption slump is not merely a purchasing-power problem. It is a collective reappraisal of old brand narratives by consumers who have reclaimed the right to interpret, the right to choose, and the right to walk away.
Why Are Middle-Aged Dads Quitting Baijiu — and Catching the Blond-Hair Bug?
From middle-aged men dyeing their hair blond to young women redefining Jingjiu, consumption is shifting from performing a social role to expressing personal sovereignty.
From "You Don't Get It" to "You Call the Shots"
The new consumption narrative isn't about writing another brand story — it's about rebuilding the relationship between brands and consumers: from educating and defining, to listening, accompanying, and lifting up.
How to Turn Narrative into Action
After diagnosing why the old narrative has failed, brands need to turn positioning, emotion, scene, and community into actions that can be executed, verified, and iterated.
Why Are Young People Increasingly Turned Off by Authority?
When consumers have the power to refuse and walk away, the old narratives built on authority endorsements, social-obligation pressure, and a lecturing tone are losing their grip.
AI Is Reorganizing Consumer Decision-Making
As AI enters search, comparison, and recommendation, the structure of consumer decision-making is being reorganized.
When AI Starts Deciding for Consumers, FMCG Becomes the Front Line
Why FMCG becomes an early battleground when AI begins discovering, comparing, and choosing on behalf of consumers.
In the Third Consumer Era, Every Brand Must Be Rebuilt
How the third consumer era changes demand, brand value, and the way companies grow.
From Scarcity to Abundance to Emotion: Forty Years of Chinese Consumption
A structural history of forty years of Chinese consumption, from scarcity and abundance to emotional value.
Ten Dilemmas Facing Marketing in China, According to DeepSeek
Using DeepSeek to re-examine ten structural dilemmas facing marketing in China.
What GPT-4 Says About the Future of Consumption, Brands, Marketing, and China
A systematic conversation with GPT-4, at the moment of its arrival, about the future of consumption, brands, marketing, and China.
Private-Domain Commerce Is Not About Contact, but Relationship
The core of private-domain commerce is not possessing contact details, but building durable customer relationships.