From Product=Lifestyle to Lifestyle=Product
This New York Times article starts with a well worn branding concept ’start with the product, create a lifestyle around it’ and turns it on its head. A-Ron, the featured artist, starts with his lifestyle and makes it his product. A-Ron, a regular of downtown New York is capitalizing on his coolness, literally.
This quote from the article sums it up:
A-Ron was not only cool enough, he was photographed for Supreme ads and became its “unofficial face.”… by the time Bondaroff was 21, he was visiting Tokyo and getting asked for autographs by kids who had seen his picture in magazines. “I was always bugged out by that — people are like, ‘Oh, you’re that guy,”’ he told me not long ago. “You get famous for nothing.” (emphasis mine -ed.)
I have seen something similar here in Seattle and in other major metropolitan areas.
However, I think it is wearing a bit thin.
You see, there are many, many, more ‘cool’ designers/scenesters now than when I was little. In light of this, each designer/scenester’s personal brand is diluted by all of the other designers/scenesters. There just simply isn’t enough ‘cool’ to go around.
If everyone is an outsider then outside must eventually be the norm.
You are what your consumer thinks you are.
In light of tonight’s presentation by designer Corbet Curfman, it is interesting how effective it can be to focus on a bulletproof & focused identity that neatly sums up what your product is and measuring this success by how well independent consumers can identify those qualities innately.
