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The bottle service club today pitches Goffman’s “action” to the world’s new elite; it encourages the rich to flaunt their riches, to display wealth for display’s sake. Bottle service clubs are predicated on conspicuous consumption, a term coined, in 1899, by Thorstein Veblen, the quirky Norwegian American economist.
Ashley Mears • Very Important People: Status and Beauty in the Global Party Circuit
The “Veblen effect” was coined in 1950 by economist Harvey Leibenstein, who pointed out that consumer demand depended not only on the functional utility of goods but also on certain social factors: a desire to be “in style” (the “bandwagon effect”); a desire to stand out from the herd (the “snob effect”); and a desire for “conspicuous consumption,”
... See moreJan Chipchase • Hidden in Plain Sight: How to Create Extraordinary Products for Tomorrow's Customers
1. Patricians
high wealth, low need for status
ex: Loro Piana
2. Parvenus
high wealth, high need
ex: Birkin lawsuit
3. Poseurs
low wealth, high need
ex: dupes, Stanleys
4. Proletarians
low wealth, low need
ex: Carhartt
Danielle Vermeer • Tweet
Cynical as he may have been, Veblen was very much on point about two things: the pursuit of status requires evidence to support one’s cause; and ostentation, vulgar as it may seem, is rather strong evidence that someone isn’t poor.
Jan Chipchase • Hidden in Plain Sight: How to Create Extraordinary Products for Tomorrow's Customers
The economist Thorstein Veblen observed that in some cases increasing price can, by itself, increase demand and decreasing price can, by itself, decrease demand.