Nostalgic Consumption

Vinyl records are examples of nostalgic consumption

Nostalgic consumption is a collective phenomenon that arose in 1970 as the purchasing of items that recall icons of the past, mainly from the 1950s. Taking advantage of the desire of belonging that characterizes nostalgic consumers, brands develop products similar to the originals produced in the past, negotiating their meaning and aesthetic features in order to make them appealing for the present market.

Sociology and anthropology

Nostalgic consumption originated in the 1970s when nostalgia spread at a collective level. Since the beginning of the XX century, nostalgia has been studied by psychologists and doctors as a mental illness caused by a yearning for the past. But it is only from the 70s that the past became a commodity. Experts who attempted to study the social effects of nostalgia identified in the 1970s the decade where the most peculiar changes occurred.^[1] The first event that somehow officiated the birth of nostalgic consumption is the inclusion of a new meaning for the term in the most important dictionaries of the time, which recognized the new identity of nostalgia as a widespread cultural phenomenon and rejected its link to mental illness. As one of the first to do so, the 1974 edition of Meyers Enzyklopädisches Lexikon included an entry on nostalgia defined as an enthusiastic return to past times which has been idealized in memory.^[2]

Nonetheless, semiologists and editors contributed only in a small part to the wider process of affirmation of nostalgic consumption. In fact, anthropologists and sociologists noticed a general renegotiation of culture and traditions, which started to be massively influenced by historical circumstances and social context typical of the 1970s. But it is mainly from the 1950s, at the end of the Second World War, that societies felt nostalgic of the wealth and well-being of the pre-war period. Confused and shocked by the dramatic consequences of such military conflicts, people realized that they were not members of a community (which was destroyed by the war) and began to search for it in the `amoenus` past. The result was a romanticization of the past that brought people to depict it as better than it actually was.^[3]

With the increasing urbanization and disruptive technological changes that brought to the rise of globalization, lifestyles and culture changed dramatically. The majority of people were unable to positively respond to these shifts, feeling increasingly alone and estranged. This is the reason why the present and the future were connoted with images of unsafety and uncertainty, and the past seemed to be familiar and secure, since it had already occurred. During the 1970s, people were affected by the so-called “nostalgia wave”, a collective sentiment which consists in seeking relief in the cultural childhood of a population.

The first ten years of the 21st century are labeled “Re-Decade”, to say a period dominated by the “re-” prefix: revival, renovation and recycling to mention some trends. The attention was drawn on how nostalgia affected consumption. This phenomenon involved theatre, fashion, gaming, and, most of all, pop music, which began to be distinguishable for a lack of originality and a limited repertoire to the revival of past songs. This trend is caused by new technologies of sharing, such as the Internet and YouTube, which let users upload and share an incredible amount of videos and digital content, and software that can be easily used to generate “new” music.^[4]

One of the most recent analyses of nostalgia denounces a general sentiment of nostalgia that affects contemporary society, which is then called the “age of nostalgia”. Today, more than ever, nostalgia is entrenched in everyday life. This behavior can be justified by recognizing the nostalgic attitude of present organizations, which believe that what worked in the past is still valid today.^[5]

Nostalgia is today exploited by brands and organizations for marketing purposes, recalling icons from the 1960s. This behavior is based on the assumption that a nostalgic bonding occurs ubiquitously in a variety of forms and that there is no limit to the kind of objects that can carry nostalgia.^[6] The most iconic examples can be found in fashion and entertainment, photography, cinema, and music.

Marketing

In times of insecurity, uncertainty, and dissatisfaction, consumers seek comfort in products that are perceived as familiar and nostalgic. These products help consumers cope with insecurity because they give the consumers a sense of security, familiarity, safety, and warmth.^[7]

Brand nostalgia can be defined as a “positively-valenced past feelings experienced when a perceived old brand evokes positive past memories, lived or learned”. This concept consists of three main dimensions: personal and historical memories, and perceived oldness.^[8] What differentiates a nostalgic brand from a non-nostalgic brand are its roots, which can be found in a past historical period, and its loyalty, coherence, and consistency with its past values. By remaining consistent with its past values, the brand succeeds in reassuring the consumers, giving them a sense of order, comfort, and security. Nevertheless, a nostalgic brand evolves and changes because of market advance and progress.

The main features of the consumers’ perception of a nostalgic brand are: word-of-mouth, attachment to the brand, and self-concept connections. As a matter of fact, nostalgic brands enable consumers to express their stories linked to the brand, and it generates an intense attachment, since the consumers’ identity is reflected in the brand.^[9] In order to evoke nostalgic feelings, products should have a high level of awareness and they shouldn't be consumed daily. Moreover, the power of nostalgia is achieved through three main features of the brand: perceived oldness, recall of consumers’ lived or learned memories, and elicitation of feelings. A brand is considered nostalgic not on the basis of its objective age, but depending on the consumers’ perception of its age. Consequently, a brand which is perceived to have a long history can be considered nostalgic. The most important step of the nostalgia-evoking process is the recalling of positive memories, which trigger affective reactions, so that nostalgia can be evoked successfully.

Nostalgia can have two main applications in the field of marketing. First, it can be used as a positioning strategy of the brand, so that it permeates different elements of the marketing mix. Secondly, it can be limited to a specific element of the marketing mix.^[10]

The main elements of the marketing mix which can convey nostalgia are packaging and advertising.

Packaging

Packaging is one of the most relevant elements of the marketing mix, since it reflects the brand identity and image, but it also gives important cues about the product itself. Through elements of visual design, such as logos, colors, pictures, and images, the packaging can trigger involuntary memories and positive emotions associated with the product and the brand. Involuntary autobiographical memories concern memories of personal experiences that are remembered spontaneously. They are considered to be one of the drivers of nostalgia evocation, because these memories are often composed of positive emotions, which are triggered by a specific element of the packaging. Moreover, involuntary autobiographical memories affect thought and behavior.^[11]

Advertising

Advertising elements have the power to trigger imagery processing, which consists in the generation of a sensory representation of a memory that enables people to relive past experiences. It can be said that people usually react to nostalgic advertisements with self-referencing thoughts, which are more likely to be salient and positive. Consequently, a more favorable reaction to the advertisement and to the advertised brand is possible. As a consequence, the level of consumers’ involvement and retention is increased.^[12] Moreover, theories show that self-referencing thoughts affect and predict purchase intentions. For instance, the more personalized the ad, the more effective it is to convey the message and trigger the desired emotional reaction of the consumers.^[13]

Photography

Among the various media involved in nostalgic consumption there is photography, both analogue and digital. Analogue photography consists in the use of instant cameras or cameras which use films and must be printed in a darkroom. Digital photography, instead, includes images shot with mobile phones, but what matters in the phenomenon of nostalgic consumption is that they are edited with faux-vintage filters through the use of apps.

Analogue photography

People use analogue cameras to shoot flawed photos in order to create a sense of authenticity and security that seems to be lost in today's world characterized by the fast replacement of products.^[14]

One of the examples of the analogue comeback is Lomography, a firm and artistic movement centered on the use of LOMO LC-A cameras, devices that require traditional films to create old-looking pictures.^[15] As a survey conducted by the firm shows, the composition of the community is diverse: 50% are between 20 and 30 years old, more than 10% are over 40, and nearly 20% are under 19.^[16] Therefore, it seems that mainly young people feel a sense of nostalgia for analogue photography, even if some of them were not even born when those cameras were used.

Polaroid is another example of nostalgic consumption. Its popularity is due to its photographic quality and authenticity: as a matter of fact, Polaroid photography offers an exceptional quality of pictures, and amateurs believe in its authenticity when confronted with digital photography because instant photos are unique and cannot be copied as digital ones.^[17] Scott W. Hardy, the CEO of Polaroid, maintains that “there’s a nostalgia to instant photography for generations of consumers who grew up with it, and there’s a novelty to it for generations of consumers who grew up in the digital age and have never held an actual photo in their hands until recently, and instant photography offers users something tangible and physical in today’s digital, often transactional, world.”^[18]

The last example of this willingness to return to the analogue is given by Reflex, which launched a campaign on Kickstarter to raise funds to bring the SLR camera back. The new version of the camera will be a compromise between digital and analogue: it will use films, but it will also have the possibility to be connected to an app for mobile phones. The description of the campaign states: “Reflex pairs the nostalgia of film with high-quality technology, to bring the experience of shooting on film to a new generation of photographers.”^[19]

Faux-vintage filters

Examples of nostalgic consumption can also be found in modern devices, where people can download photo apps, such as Hipstamatic or Instagram, to edit pictures using filters. This practice has been called faux-vintage photography; as a matter of fact, filters make photos look as if they were shot with analogue cameras, creating an effect of ‘false-vintage’.

On Instagram, faux-vintage effects such as scrapes, dust specks, or burnt edges can be added, and particular frames that simulate the Polaroid, LOMO, or Holga ones can be recreated. Whereas in analogue cameras those effects were caused by errors or inexpensive material, in modern devices they are used to compensate for the perfection of the digital, conveying an authentic appearance to photos.^[20]

Filters are partly used to make photos more attractive, but their widespread use is mainly linked to the ‘repro nova’ marketing strategy, which consists of the mixture of old-style techniques with new technologies.^[21] Instagram's repro nova feature is that it can store memories and at the same time cause a ‘timeless nostalgia’. The majority of its users are indeed young people, and for them this nostalgia does not involve emotions associated with the materiality of the film; rather, faux vintage filters “graphically age our moments to show the here and now as a past for which we are already nostalgic”; this practice, thus, embodies “a way to stay connected with the past, creating memories, and displaying authentic moments”.^[22]

Hipstamatic also resorted to the repro nova strategy when designing the application. The director Mario Estrada thought that when people shoot with mobile phones, the image produced is only an aseptic representation of the surroundings, and emotions are not part of it. Therefore, the creators of the application decided to involve feelings in ordinary snapshots through the use of filters.^[23]

Filters also have a negative side: they are used to make snapshots distinct and authentic, but given the fact that everybody is employing the same practice, everyone's photos are looking similar, and the attempt to make oneself unique fails.^[24]

Entertainment

One of the dimensions in which the phenomenon of nostalgia emerges most is that of entertainment, within which it is articulated in different ways according to the different categories examined.

Cinema and television

The motion picture industry has a long history of re-telling tales, with remakes and adaptations featuring prominently in film history. Remakes date back to the silent era, with the release of The Bold Bank Robbery, an unauthorized version of Edwin S. Porter's The Great Train Robbery. The introduction of sound, during the 30s, facilitated a culture of remakes, as it allowed producers to do them all over again. Technicolor provided a similar impetus, and so did digital remastering and surround sound. Remakes allowed budget-conscious studios to save on scriptwriting and bank on proven audience appeal. In this environment, remakes tended to retain strong similarities with their predecessors, maintaining connotations of replication and simulation and stimulating audience's fond memory for the original production. A similar but somewhat different trend is the reboot one, which consists of a way to “restart an entertainment universe that has already been established”^[25], exploiting the nostalgia element of the public but adapting the script to a different narrative context. An adaptation, instead, consists in the creation of a new story with a certain degree of license, whose source material comes from a different medium. The trend for adaptations capitalizes on nostalgia for original shows, as people tend to feel a sense of familiarity with recollections of television personalities, which are relevant in terms of nostalgic impact. Cinema has an established tradition of movies based on popular TV shows. This trend began with a few films in the early 1990s, with a following concentration of movies released in the late 1990s and after the 2000s. Moreover, sequels and franchises appear to be a feature of TV adaptations with the production of a significant number of sequels, but beyond the adaptation from TV shows, it's possible to observe many examples of sequels produced several years after the previous chapter, during which it usually becomes a cult^[26]. The new millennium brought a trend for all things retro on a broad cultural level, especially in western societies; marketers call it “newstalgia”, which is defined as the love of old things from the past revived in what designers call “the contemporary classics”. In the era of digital video and online streaming platforms, references to the past, and in particular to the 80s, can be explained by observing a renewed interest in nostalgia which is caused by the digital revolution; “outbreaks of nostalgia often follow revolutions”, and that may lead to the commemoration of elements from the past making them appear in contemporary productions. Several TV series make great use of references to the 80s through quotes to films of the time, video games, music, and objects of everyday life. “Analogue nostalgia” emerges, defined as a technique where products of popular culture “quote certain characteristics typically associated with analogue inscription within digital media in a more or less self-reflexive fashion”, and denouncing digital imaging's perfect quality, that can result in a subsequent loss of realism, resulting for the audience in a more negative, unnerving response^[27]

Video games

Even game companies, game journalists, and players represent, revisit, and rethink their own and game communities’ earlier experiences. The knowledge of these “game classics” is mediated from one user generation to another and leads to a practice of playing and collecting original (classic) videogames of the 1970s, the 1980s, and the early 1990s, or using emulators for playing them. Game companies and corporations benefit from history management strategy, which consists of revisiting plans of their older and current products based on some “nostalgia exploitation potential”, and they do that in different ways. Nintendo’s use of history consists of a deep alliance between game hardware and self-produced game software. In addition, it constantly fortifies its key iconic gaming characters and brands such as Super Mario Bros, combining old game characters with new innovations and playabilities. Sony also leans on popular games of its earlier consoles, especially games of the original PlayStation like Tekken and Castlevania, even if most of the Sony PS Network downloadable games are novelties. In late 2011, Sony started to advertise emulated PS1 games: “Return to your golden memories with the most popular PlayStation games in their era. Re-experience the great moments of game history in emulated classic games, which were once released for the original PlayStation. Download your favourite from the versatile selection of PS one games – now you can play classics either with PSP or PlayStation 3. There are inexpensive games for every taste.” Microsoft has several retro game products in its virtual shop and the Microsoft Live Arcade service. There is, for example, a selection of classic games and game series made for the PC environment before Xbox, such as Prince of Persia, Worms, Doom, and Monkey Island. In the summer of 2010, there were about 300 games in online stores, and Microsoft advertised its service with the following slogan: “First class games from updated retro classics to the newest hits”.^[28] The tendency of the so-called “retro-gamers” to proceed in the opposite direction to that of a market projected towards the future can derive from the emergence of nostalgic feelings. At least initially, the period of greatest fruition of this medium is generally childhood or adolescence; picking up a title played in the past is an opportunity to re-evoke the atmosphere, often perceived as a positive experience already lived. What makes this kind of nostalgia special is that the reintroduction of past games onto the market gives the video gamer the opportunity to return exactly to those places and past experiences, in a virtual environment that persists unchanged over time, giving it the possibility to interact again with objects from the past. Even the spread of smartphones, for which the various stores re-propose old titles, revives the basic gameplay mechanics of old videogames in terms of mobile entertainment. A notable case is that of Pokémon Go, which integrates augmented reality technology with a very successful franchise in the 90s, taking advantage of the original game dynamics. Pokémon Go offers an evident case of how to take advantage of the nostalgic thrust of retrogaming to renew videogame-oriented technologies, without stopping at the simple repetition of an experience crystallized over time.^[29]

Music

Since at least the late eighteenth century, there has been an ongoing current in European thought and culture of the ideology of nostalgia. The musical strategy utilized by Max Bruch in his oratorio Odysseus from 1872 was a conscious periodic triggering of reminiscence within the work through the suggestion of Handel, Bach, Mendelsohn, and Schubert; these points of recollection were designed to evoke through musical memory in the amateur choral participants and in the audience a constructed sense of shared cultural heritage. In the twentieth century, music was increasingly written to evoke a sensibility of loss for a past that neither listener nor composer could have experienced or known. Bartok and Szymanowski explain the importance of evoking folk traditions, whose function is to underscore quite distant loss and contrast with contemporary life.^[30] This kind of nostalgia is also applicable to twenty-first century's music culture, that often recalls and refers to iconic artists and songs which belong to a temporal range that goes from the 50s to the 90s. References are usually made through explicit quotes, the recording of different versions of old songs – generally performed by contemporary artists – and the publication of remastered versions of successful albums from the past. Beyond the music itself, however, nostalgia also concerns the physical means of reproduction; the disappearance of technologies such as the vinyl record or music cassette tapes, largely replaced by digital alternatives, produces nostalgic remembrance, an emotional attachment to tangible elements.^[31]

References

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