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+[1]Tom MacWright
+
+tom@macwright.com
+
+[2]Tom MacWright
+
+  • [3]Writing
+  • [4]Reading
+  • [5]Photos
+  • [6]Projects
+  • [7]Drawings
+  • [8]Micro⇠
+  • [9]About
+
+I want brands
+
+2024-12-03
+
+I think a weird thing that’s happening with capitalism right now is that I want
+brand consistency more than ever. It’s come up in conversations with friends,
+too, how brands like OXO, IKEA, Costco or Muji are starting to feel like an
+escape, rather than a luxury. Even Target, in-store, is kind of a place where
+you can, mostly, buy a thing that is fine.
+
+It’s mostly because of the Amazon effect. Amazon went from a store to a
+‘marketplace’ of drop-shipped nameless junk that takes too long to wade
+through. Alibaba was this kind of experience before Amazon even thought about
+it. Walmart is the same sort of experience now. It’s an overwhelming and
+complicated experience: I’ll look at t-shirts, and for the same ‘brand’, there
+are multiple ‘sellers’ from whom Amazon dynamically picks to serve my sale. The
+color blue is two cents cheaper than green. For anything more complicated than
+a t-shirt, the odds of it being a [10]counterfeit are fairly high.
+
+I don’t want to engage in the supply chain this much, and I don’t think most
+people do either, even if it enables incredible new levels of cheapness.
+
+To some extent, Amazon has to be a reflection of consumer preference: buying
+more stuff, faster, for the cheapest price possible. And e-commerce is a hard
+industry.
+
+But I strongly believe that there’s an opportunity for a brand like Costco’s
+‘Kirkland’ or OXO to become the standard place for middle-class people to buy
+stuff. Paying 5-10% more for something with better odds of being genuine and
+high-quality, and for a less overwhelming junk-pile buying experience… there’s
+something there.
+
+
+References:
+
+[1] https://macwright.com/
+[2] https://macwright.com/
+[3] https://macwright.com/writing/
+[4] https://macwright.com/reading/
+[5] https://macwright.com/photos/
+[6] https://macwright.com/projects/
+[7] https://macwright.com/drawings/
+[8] https://macwright.com/micro/
+[9] https://macwright.com/about/
+[10] https://prospect.org/power/2024-08-28-amazon-counterfeit-problem-ink-cartridges/