In 2024, sales of plastic bags increased for the first time since 2015. Why? The cumulative effect of the online shopping boom, which uses plastic bags by default. Ocado, perhaps most synonymous with the practice, sold 221 million plastic bags in 2024 – the equivalent of 51 per cent of the total sold in the UK.
All Threads
A 2024 YouGov report claims that brand buying has become politicised, citing several examples of brands that appeal to different political leanings. But the crucial caveat is that this is based on attitudes not behaviours, and two are very different. Actual purchase data shows that liberals are only 3% more likely than conservatives to buy Ben and Jerry’s. And conservatives are actually 13% more likely to buy Patagonia, despite the brand’s close association with environmental causes.
In 1994, an American health organisation caused popcorn sales to plummet by 50%. A study had shown that a medium bag of popcorn contained 37 grams of saturated fat, so the organisation turned this abstract number into a terrifying reality: the same amount of fat as six Big Macs.
Recent neuroscience studies have shown that our brain is predictive, not reactive. It’s, quite literally, powered by expectations. When we drink a glass of water it actually takes tens of minutes to reach the blood, but it instantly feels like our thirst is quenched – that’s because our brain predicts the restorative effect of water as soon as we drink it.
In the 2022/23 season, Arsenal led the table for 247 days (93% of total) but eventually lost out to Man City – who only led for 28 days (7%).
Received wisdom is that premium brands are bought by affluent consumers. In reality, affluent consumers are just as likely to buy mass market products as they are premium products – it’s not all about the money.
A voucher with a twist: it’s designed to be passed on to a friend. As a result the final recipient gets a nice drink, but most importantly the giver ends up happier than if they’d kept the voucher.
In the UK, landlords who hold property in registered companies (rather than their personal name) can deduct 100 per cent of their borrowing costs from their tax bill. The result is that there are now 401,744 buy-to-let firms – four times the number of fast food takeaways or hairdressers.
This group of politically engaged, cosmopolitan, and environmentally conscious people only make up 8% of the total UK population, but they account for the vast majority of Labour party members and policy employees. I’d argue the gap is a big deal, given this group is responsible for setting the entire country’s agenda.
68% of people saying they bought a laundry brand in the past 3 months didn’t buy it at all (according to panel data).
Purple clothes seem ordinary to us, but to the Ancient Greeks they symbolised power. Purple dye was incredibly hard to find – coming from a sea snail called the murex – so it was only accessible to emperors, priests, kings and judges. It wasn’t until 1856 that a British chemist found a synthetic version of purple, soon making it available to the masses.
Wedding dresses are synonymous with white, but we only have Queen Victoria to thank for this. When she married Prince Albert in 1840, she decided to buck the trend of wearing red (white was reserved for courtrooms), and popularised a trend that has remained ever since.
After the Queen’s Gambit began ruling the Netflix charts in late 2020, Chess.com saw a 400% rise in registrations, while US sales of chess sets on eBay soared by 60%.
The celebrated director makes his movies with an audience in mind, but that audience isn’t a big group: “It’s me – I am the audience. I am the guy who pays $8 to go and see a movie, and I’m betting there are other people like me out there.”
Quorn initially targeted their products at vegetarians and vegans. After all, who else would want to buy plant-based meals? But they soon discovered that these meals also appealed to health conscious non-vegans. This insight led Quorn to rebrand as a ‘healthy food’ company, famously partnering with openly meat-eating Mo Farah, and helped them massively expand their buyer base (and sales).