​​I was asked by the editors of the American Journal of Consumer Research  to contribute a new provocative piece on the future of consumer collectives recently. After a short call with Dr. Giana Eckhardt, the journal's editor and Professor of Marketing at King's Business School, King's College London, it became clear that the piece would go in a radically different direction. This was finally the opportunity to tell the whole story: the story of what is happening with consumers, brands, and culture, how we got here, and where we go from here to navigate a more meaningful and sustainable future for business, people, society, and the planet. The succinct version of this paper is now published in the special edition of the JACR journal, entitled New Insights on Consumption Collectives (Vol. 6, No. 4, October 2021). You can access my paper here.

​

But once I started writing, I realized there was so much more to the story to tell. The state of the industry that we're in today. The shift happening in the market after COVID pushing us to awaken to our own humanity. The limits of the current brand-consumer paradigm based on desire, aspiration, and transactional relationships. The evolution of our collective psyche over the last 100 years of consumerism, individualism, and commodification of human consciousness, and how our consciousness has changed from human beings to consumers. And finally, the dual role that brands play in our lives, either profiting from exploiting our desires by leading us astray, or increasing our human well-being by acting as catalysts to advance society.

​​

The latter is the new humanistic way that brands can exist in our world if only we dare to envision a new future for business that stems from humanity, sustainability, integrity, and consciousness – to create new forms of human value that benefit people and add meaningful value to our lives. You will find this full story in a new exclusive study that I published below. I plan to expand my research, apply this new thinking to brands, add new business cases of organizations using brands as a force for good, who are pioneering and championing Humanistic Capitalism, and publish these in a new extended study or a book.

​

For now, until the book comes out, I simply felt the urge to set the story straight and offer the much-needed and largely missing interpretations and philosophical explanations of why the current system of business, brands, and value creation is no longer working, why it's hitting its limits today, and what we can to fix it. All of it with one sole intention: to finally move the industry conversation forward and start generating real, tangible, and measurable results for good. Here's the rationale why:

​​​

Today's business world is devoid of meaning in so many ways because it is fundamentally devoid of humanity. It is not aligned with where we are going as the human collective and is not fit for purpose. The challenge with meaning we are facing today is systemic. It is consequential as a result of how we set up the systems that organize today's society. It is a large-scale system failure. An error in judgment that does not take into account our humanity. The whole system in which we still conduct business and create value is unsustainable: ideologically, socially, economically, culturally, environmentally, and ethically. 

 

Greed is no longer good as a foundational principle of either business or consumption. Transactions are not enough. People are not here to be consumers and serve the business needs; businesses are here to serve the needs of people. We desperately lack something larger to strive for in business to make the value that we create meaningful again. We need to learn how to produce new forms of value in business that are for human benefit, and not just to generate profit.

 

As we alienated people from the results of their own value creation by fragmenting and automating the production process in the name of efficiency, meaning was lost. And if it was lost on the workers' part, consumers have felt it too. We churn out products with no meaning and no soul that benefit no one – including the companies that produce them, and create toxic waste as a result. The system we abide by is creating lose-lose-lose scenarios for the business itself, its customers, and the planet. That is a definition of stupidity. In the 21st century, we are evolved and educated enough to know and do better. This is not just the question of doing things in a more humane way. This is a question of good business sense and future profitability because business is, first and foremost, a social discipline. And so it needs to produce things that people want to consume. And people want to consume things that are of fundamental benefit to them and their own lives.

 

We have to create business with consciousness.​ For this to happen, we need to find a new foundational principle that unites us rather than divides us and gives us a chance to collectively create a new and better future. In other words, we need a new narrative for business driven by radically different values and human motivations than a pragmatic self-interest advocated by Milton Friedman. We need to develop a new ideological system for business rooted in our humanity and core values. We need to radically reimagine the business paradigm so that we can use the social power of brands for a larger good.

​

This study explores the intricate power dynamics between brands and people in the existing business paradigm and traces back the fundamental origins of our unsustainable ideology of consumerism. It also gives a glimpse into the emerging reality today that is leading us back to meaning and humanity in an effort to reclaim the fundamental essence of all value creation: our human potential. It is only when the business world aligns with where humanity is already going that we can create the future of commerce as a force for good.

 

I wholeheartedly believe that commerce can become the most potent force for positive social, cultural, political, economic, and environmental change, that is, if and when we learn to harness its immense power consciously and for a higher purpose. To make this vision a reality, we must first make an evolutionary step in consciousness. When businesses become conscious of the impact of their actions and act for the collective benefit, they can become catalysts of real change in the world.

​​

I look forward to hearing your feedback.

​​

Dr. Martina Olbert

​

Founder & CEO, Meaning Global

​