Nostalgia is Just Expensive Archaeology
Welcome to Wednesday, futurists.
We’re in the endgame now. It’s thirteen days until our biggest show of the year, and I’m unearthing fears and anxieties buried deep within like they’re time capsules—buried with intention, meant to be opened eventually, but not now; definitely not now (yes, I used an em-dash, I’ll never forgive ChatGPT for ruining the em-dash for all of us.)
Despite what you may believe, a time capsule’s worst enemy isn’t the elements. Sure, hundreds, even thousands of years of earth, silt, and soil can take their toll, but human ingenuity can overcome that. Just look at Roman concrete. When building their 1938 time capsule, Westinghouse engineers created a new alloy, Cupaloy, to last for five millennia.
No, no. The greatest threat to a time capsule is curiosity.
We love to unearth the past: literally and metaphorically. Nostalgia marketing is so effective because it’s deeply ingrained in our DNA. We’re consumers: consumers of ideas, of vibes, of feelings, and of eras.
When we’ve run out of things to consume in this culture we quite literally dig up the past and consume it whole.
Time capsules represent simultaneity—past, present, and future colliding in a single buried moment. It's a Janus moment, named for the Roman god of thresholds. In thirteen days, we'll explore how time, space, and brands intersect in our own cultural capsule at VISIONS Summit: NYC.
This is the subject of my talk at VISIONS Summit: NYC. I’ll delve into time capsules, brand culture, and, when nothing left remains of this age, it was consumer brands that were the greatest preservers of our culture.
I hope you’ll join me.
— Phillip
P.S. If you need more convincing, I have three early bird discounts ($150 OFF) available on this code: PHILLIPFCV. Click here to register: futurecommerce.com/visions
Content’s New Quality-Fidelity Continuum
In the current media landscape, content exists on a sliding scale based on quality and fidelity. While quality is self-explanatory, fidelity ranges from low, which requires multiple senses to engage and is more participatory, to high, which is the opposite.
Here's the twist: AI tools are collapsing this framework entirely. What we once dismissed as "slop" (low-quality, low-fidelity content) can now achieve cinematic production values seemingly overnight.
Meanwhile, high-budget "premium" content increasingly feels participatory, spawning memes faster than studios can control narratives. When every feed becomes saturated with artificial excellence, brands face a binary choice: flood every surface until they become ambient noise, or retreat behind deliberate mystery that requires pilgrimage to understand.
Choose wisely—the middle ground is quicksand.
From Pointless to Positionless. Marketers are feeling pressure to do more with less. But most marketing teams are beholden to assembly-line workflows that lead to bottlenecks and inefficiencies. The new era of marketing requires a powerful combination of operational agility and human intuition.
With our latest season of Decoded, we explore Positionless marketing. It's fluid and dynamic. It’s real-time. And it’s led by creative problem-solvers who are equally strategic thinkers and tactical doers. Learn more about what to expect this season.
Luxury for Your Ears. Hermès just released $15,000 leather headphones for people who think AirPods Max are for peasants. And we do mean luxe: one pair will set you back $15,000. Crafted with hand-stitched and metallic finishes inspired by the Kelly bag, the headphones have the high-quality craftsmanship and materials synonymous with the Hermès brand. This, the latest addition to an expanding assortment of custom goods, which also includes cricket bats and portable cocktail bars. Because nothing says ‘taste economy’ like paying luxury handbag prices to listen to the same Spotify playlist as everyone else.
E.l.f.'s Billion-Dollar Question: Can You Buy Bieber's Secret Sauce? E.l.f. Beauty is acquiring Hailey Bieber's skincare brand, Rhod, for up to $1 billion, marking the biggest acquisition in the drugstore darling's history. The deal breaks down to $800 million in cash and stock, plus an additional $200 million if Rhode meets performance targets over the next three years.
Our Take: Rhode went from zero to $212 million in revenue in under three years with just 10 products, proving that sometimes a famous last name and a good peptide cream can move mountains. (Don’t forget the iPhone case so famous even her husband copied her.)
E.l.f. CEO Tarang Amin called it ‘disruption,’ which is Clayton Christianese for “avoiding S-curve disruptors.” The acquisition lets E.l.f. chase higher-income consumers while Rhode gets global distribution beyond its current DTC-only model. Bieber stays on as chief creative officer, presumably to continue looking dewy in Instagram posts that sell $28 serums to people who think drugstore skincare is beneath them.
Eau de Serial Killer. Thirty-three years later, Patrick Bateman is getting his own signature scent from 19-69 Parfum—and no, it doesn't smell like duct tape and existential dread. If you’re curious, it smells like protagonist (and psychopath) Patrick Bateman, which means it’s a combination of “fine sparkling water, icy sorbet, and a bright aroma of a freshly laundered suit.” Oddly enough, duct tape and plastic tarps are not in the mix.
Despite being released more than 30 years ago, “American Psycho” has remained a cultural fixture, largely thanks to the enduring popularity of the film starring Christian Bale, which has garnered an incredibly loyal, cult-like following. Rumblings of a reboot have also brought the source material back into the cultural discourse.
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