How We Fell Prey to Logomania
Are we nearing the end of logomania or is it just gathering steam?
“So why was Kim Kardashian famous? Because she was very good at marketing herself, that was all - and today, that was enough. Corporations are now people, and people are now products, known as "brands.” At a time when the 1 percent was getting richer, the 99 percent was suddenly trying to Keep up with the Kardashians.”
-Nancy Jo Sales
Between 2008 and 2009, a group of upper-middle-class juveniles aptly named "The Bling Ring" carried out a series of celebrity robberies, nabbing over $3 million worth of designer handbags, cash, jewelry, and dresses. They'd sting Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, and Audrina Patridge, a reality TV star, in a pursuit to collect "beautiful, gorgeous things, like Marc Jacobs, Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent.” When pressed about the motivations of the crimes, co-ringleader Nick Prugo mentioned "that he and his accomplices never discussed “why.”' expanding, “We just did it. I know it sounds dumb, but [the ringleader] just wanted the clothes. She wanted to look pretty.” The crime syndicate would post pictures to Facebook and Twitter, showing off their stolen goods while racking up likes from their peers and strangers alike. With the democratization of fame and the availability of instant global communication, Nancy Jo Sales, the Vanity Fair writer covering The Bling Ring, noted, “Everybody had become their own fan. Everybody was their own paparazzi,” and what these juveniles wanted most was to be admired.
On October 6, 2010: Instagram launched, and by December 12, 2010, it reached one million users. A platform had emerged for the “every day” creatives to have a global audience that could engage with content and create fanbases out of followers; ipso facto, the influencer was created. When engagement started increasing, and tagging became a feature for influencers to knock on brands’ doors quietly, marketing departments began to notice. Kering, the parent company of Gucci and the highest-scoring digital impact brand reported by Reuters, noted that half of its media budget was allocated to digital media by 2018, up 20 percent from 2015. Also by 2018, 10 percent of social media influencers were earning over $100,000, up 370 percent from just the year before. Social media stars became the new fashion It girls, acting as stylists, editors, publishers, and paparazzi. They sat front-row at fashion week and were inundated with PR packages sporting the latest trends—notably, the logo, whose prevalence had begun to run rampant.
Sarah Unger, SVP of Cultural Insights for Civic Entertainment Group, told The Daily Beast, “Unsurprisingly, I think the people we see leaning most into this trend [logomania] are influencers or those who want to be sponsored,” Unger added, “You have people rocking logos as a mark of, ‘I’ve made it.’” Once an unsponsored post hit a certain level of engagement, it wasn’t (and isn’t) uncommon for brands to slide into an influencer’s direct messages. For a luxury brand, a $3,000 bag, which likely costs $1000 to produce, has a better return-on-investment by trading with a successful influencer for a featured post than a billboard. It reaches the world, not just La Cienega Boulevard in Los Angeles. It's smart, efficient business.
Logos are marketing geared for the split second, as it takes merely 400 milliseconds (.4 seconds) for our brain to register a known logo. According to Entrepreneur Magazine, after those 400 milliseconds, “well-liked brands trigger responses in the same areas of the brain that process human relationships.” Read that again: well-liked brand logos trigger responses the same way that people process human relationships. Now, combine that with people most likely to be influenced by unilateral relationships with celebrity influencers—those seeking an "ideal self" often derived from a lack of valuable human connections.
Parasocial relationships—one-way relationships fans have with celebrities and influencers—overlap with the same community likely to seek human relationships in non-human interaction. According to The Arch Public Health, results from three studies on parasocial relationships note that “people with low self-esteem used celebrity relationships to move closer to their ideal self, a benefit that people with high self-esteem derive from real relationship partners.” Those most likely to engage (or be influenced) tended to lack warm human relationships—a hole that luxury labeled goods could psychologically close—all within a half-second. To further the point, “Studies show that consumers are particularly attracted to luxury when they feel less confident and less powerful compared to others, and they anticipate to experience a boost in confidence and power by buying and consuming luxury,” says Nailya Ordabayeva, associate professor of marketing at Boston College Carroll School of Management, to CNBC.
With the average user clocking in 145 minutes of social media a day and more intelligent targeting of luxury influencer placements, even investment banks are catching on. In an October 19, 2020 research release, UBS investment bank—the third-largest in Europe—noted, “Given the rising importance of social media for luxury brands—especially in the context of millennials growth—we believe Instagram data can no longer be ignored as a data point for luxury investors.” Stock market traders and brand management alike analyze engagement stats, seeing which posts trigger a physiological response to purchase. So is it shocking that we’ve seen logomania go from camp to unavoidable? Especially as more prominent brands are being bought up by parent companies listed on publicly traded stock exchanges? If consumers project the value of human interaction onto a logo, it makes fiscal sense to allocate resources to create more products that satisfy that need. The logo is a great business model that translates to purchases, but it’s also complicated and has a dark environmental underbelly.
A logo, ideally, lasts forever—that’s how it psychologically translates into a sensation of familiarity, of familial warmth. Its everlasting quality also makes it seasonless, which is less ideal for businesses that release four collections annually and maintain constant growth or suffer stock dips. It’s potentially why recognizable brands will actively burn their merchandise rather than sell it at a discount or overflow the market. According to the Times, Burberry burned over $37 million worth of merchandise within twelve months; it was imperative to keep the products rare and “luxurious,” so people still felt a rush when purchasing. In a classic supply-demand model, these brands maintained low supply of quality manufactured goods to justify higher pricing valuation. But, it also means the environmental footprint of creating the goods was wasted, and a host of chemical-laced carbon was released.
If you were privy to the Spring/Summer 2022 collections, you might have caught one of the more evident seasons of logomania. What began as faux luxury kitsch in the Shanghai counterfeit market, the kind which accidentally blended a Versace and Fendi logo—has now become a reality. Recognizable brands like Balenciaga, Gucci, Versace, and Fendi have combined forces to release jointly branded goods in limited-release collections. And although the collections seemed playful, leaning into eccentricity, they pose much larger questions: Did we need those collections in a time where we should be watching our chemical and carbon footprint? Are investors putting pressure on designers to increase logoed goods to meet sales targets that no longer make sense? And most importantly, when does it end—when do we have enough logoed goods?
This isn't a petition to end luxury fashion. With regards to sustainability, if you're not buying thrifted goods, luxury fashion is the next best alternative. It is well-made, lasts decades not months, and is often trend-influenced, not trend-dependent. LVMH and Kering, have both made public pledges to decrease their footprint; and a Chanel jacket, a Versace black dress, and a Fendi baguette are timeless goods that can be worn repetitiously. More oft than not, a luxury fashion good can elevate the wearer aesthetically, not just psychologically—adding a certain je-ne-sais-quoi. Even Alessandro's Michele's Fake/Not collection was whimsical in its acknowledgment of Canal Street knock-offs, but there is, at some point, a limit to the logo's value in luxury fashion: is it enhancing or is it pandering?
