#lipstick effect

[alaturkaamerika]

‘Treatonomics’ Dönemi: Amerikalılar Zor Zamanlarda Keyifli Harcamalara Yöneliyor

📌 Amerikalılar, ekonomik zorluklara rağmen moral veren etkinlik ve deneyimlere para harcamaya devam ediyor. 📌 Uzmanlara göre bu trend, “lipstick effect” olarak bilinen eski bir ekonomik davranışın modern versiyonu. 📌 Artan enflasyon, yüksek faiz oranları ve iş güvencesizliği, bu harcama alışkanlığını tetikliyor. ‘Treatonomics’ Nedir? CNBC’nin haberine göre “treatonomics,” insanların sıkıntılı…

‘Treatonomics’ Dönemi: Amerikalılar Zor Zamanlarda Keyifli Harcamalara Yöneliyor

[frkt83-blog]

How to Resist Black Friday

I am starting to get many e-mails about Black Friday. There are many discounts on products on offer. Many people have been asking me if I have gone shopping to get discounts and generally I haven’t purchased anything because of Black Friday. I have written about this many times before but I believe that someone is much more likely to spend less if, instead of focusing on discounts, they instead…

View On WordPress

[nickgerlich]

Index File

As sophisticated as we academics like to see ourselves, there are just some things that defy statistical modeling. Take, for example, the Waffle House Index. Now, the name alone may cause you to think that the number of Waffle Houses in existence, the number of new store openings, or even their P&L statement, are important components of this opaque yet almost promotionally named indicator.

Turns out, though, that none of those things matter, and all that really matters is whether they’re open at all following some kind of natural disaster. When it comes to retail resilience, Waffle House is the best. They are the canary in the coal mine, and if they’re closed, you know it’s bad. Really bad. But if they’re open, you know there’s hope.

Coined by a FEMA employee after the 2011 Joplin tornado, it recognizes a chain that can turn on a dime because of its simple menu and ability to mobilize Waffle House Jump Teams in response. The index works time after time.

But there’s another index we use, and specifically among economists and other business academics and practitioners: The Lipstick Effect. No, it doesn’t mean that everyone, men included, starts wearing lots of lipstick. It refers to the phenomenon that has happened numerous times during economic downturns: women look for a small indulgence, and lipstick is often that item.

I am not sure what the men do, even though I am one of them. Maybe they’re like me. My only small indulgence is a pint of beer, but who can have just one, right? Everything else I do is expensive, and I really don’t want to track that.

While the economy was tanking earlier this year, 1Q lipstick sales soared 48% over 2021. But now they have declined 10%, signaling another important economic shift. Either things are getting better, or people are spending on other things to medicate their minds.

As it turns out, it is the latter, as the experience economy takes center stage. This phenomenon has been around all this century, but is growing rapidly, both in a general sense, as well as among Gen-Zers and Millennials who prefer experiences over tangible goods. It is the older population, though, that worries analysts, because we are now all focusing on travel, dining out, and otherwise just having a good time. The numbers are good.

You can put lipstick on a pig, too, but that’s not going to make retailers any happier as we go into the holiday season. A pig is a pig, and no matter how you dress up your economic stats, if people are spending their money on something else, or not at all, it’s going to have an effect. And you might be eating bacon and ham for a while. A long while.

Everyone from fast food to AirBnB has been experiencing robust sales of late. People are splurging on things, like their seasonal PSLs, but also fancy overnight digs. You have nothing to show for it other than memories, photographs (maybe), and the credit card statement. But those may very well be worth far more than something that sits on a shelf or hangs in a closet. And given yesterday’s blog about recommerce, this all fits together: Bearish on the tangible, bullish on the thrills.

Which may help explain my upcoming plans to take in that Dallas Stars game with my daughter and her husband. I haven’t been to an NHL game in about a decade. They’re fun, and especially if you know the game, you know where the puck is just by watching the movements of the players. It’s kind of like walking a beam: don’t look where you’re at; look where you’re going.

And then off to Florida for the holidays. I see some bike riding and photography in my future, along with quality family time. You can’t put a price on those things.

All of this points not only to changes among younger generations, but also a coping mechanism that serves a short-term purpose for all. Both generate feelings of self-worth, albeit in very different ways.

This then leads to my observation—and perhaps a little self-serving, but that’s my prerogative—that there is a silver lining to all things marketing. We sell stuff to make people happy, whether it is in meeting basic needs, or catering to abstract psychological ones. We may not need the product or service, yet we want it, even if it defies mass understanding. Women will still be women without their lipstick or other beauty products, but their personal identity may suffer in the process. And while many women scratch their heads at how a man can derive happiness on a solitary bar stool, let’s just say it happens. I get some of my best work done at Pondaseta Brewery.

As for travel and experiences, they produce a euphoria hard to pin down. They are a release, an escape hatch. And while some prefer to just chill when on vacay, I am of the mindset that if you don’t return home dog tired, you haven’t played hard enough. To each their own. Maybe your valued experience is just lying in the sand at Playa del Carmen.

Meanwhile, I’ll be watching for the women with unglossed lips, men with souvenirs from the brewery, and everyone with winter sun tans. S’All good, man. As long as we keep spending it one way or another. I just hope that none of us has to start paying attention to whether the Waffle House is open.

Dr “Counting Down To December“ Gerlich

Audio Blog

[newstfionline]

The Lipstick Effect: Greeks Discover Need to Pamper in Crisis

Reuters, Dec. 20, 2017

ATHENS--Eva Vorlioti, a divorced mother of two, was forced to move back in with her parents to make ends meet during Greece’s debt crisis. While she cannot change the past, she is trying to efface one of its reminders: Her wrinkles.

Wiping her face with a cotton pad after a Botox injection, the 49-year-old supermarket worker said she has cut down on petrol and entertainment to afford the treatments, which make the skin appear smoother by temporarily paralyzing muscles.

“I want to look at myself in the mirror and feel good. I’m afraid of aging,” Vorlioti said. “Work, the crisis, they push you down and you want something uplifting.”

She is not the only one seeking solace in beauty treatments amid a financial crisis that cut hundreds of thousands of jobs cut, slashed salaries and caused a sharp decline in life satisfaction among Greeks.

In fact, it seems Greece is undergoing what has been dubbed the “lipstick effect”, where consumers turn to low cost beauty to boost their mood during economic depressions.

Non-surgical procedures in Greece soared to more than 220,000 in 2016 compared to around 61,000 in 2010, the biggest jump in Europe in the six-year period, according to data by the International Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgery (ISAPS).

At between 80 and 150 euros a pop, it doesn’t come cheap for Greeks, who earn an average net monthly income of about 780 euros. Some, like Vorlioti, need to save up for months in order to be able to afford a treatment and yet more are choosing to have them, doctors say.

“The crisis has brought new people to the doctor’s doorstep, people who wouldn’t come before, both men and women who are struggling and want to improve their looks to feel better,” said Lia Papadavid, a dermatologist.

“It’s like giving themselves a present,” she told Reuters shortly after giving a middle-aged female a filler injection around her eyes.

The rise in Greece follows a world-wide upward trend in non-surgical procedures. It ranked 14th in the world among the top 24 countries in terms of volume of non surgical treatments in 2016, behind countries such as Italy and Germany but above Belgium, according to ISAPS.

Surgical treatments, which can cost thousands of euros, are up only 10 percent since 2010.

Waiting her turn at the Athens Aurum medical center, 43-year-old Eleni says she turned to injectables in 2013 and has not stopped despite the crisis.

“No one has money to spare, everyone is being pressured right now with the crisis, some less, some more. I think it needs a bit of planning, and to love yourself.”

[playground-7]

PeoplearemorewillingtospendonsmallindulgencessuchascosmeticsFangJinqi,32,saidthemost

[ghostsinyourteeth]

A leading economist has thrown the popular 'Lipstick Effect' theory into doubt, suggesting that the research behind it is based on 'over-generalised gender stereotypes'.

The well-known phenomenon suggests that women buy less-expensive luxury goods, such as cosmetics, in tough economic times in a bid to increase their attractiveness to mates.

But now Julie Nelson, from the University of Massachusetts, Boston, has stated that the 'overly general' findings only serve to reinforce 'stereotypes about women's lives - and social value - centering on questions of their attractiveness to men.'

She told ABC News that the theory is 'a gross over-generalization' adding that recent studies aiming to give it scientific status came from a narrow sub-class of women - young university students within the U.S.

Also that the phenomenon only applies to 'women who reported themselves to be highly motivated to attract a male romantic partner, but not among young women with low motivation'.

She added: 'Along with young women not looking for a partner, it is not at all clear that older women, married women, lesbian women, or women from other educational and cultural backgrounds would share this so-called 'women's psychology.'

Nelson said it is 'plausible' that the purchase of beauty products and make-up is an evolutionary outcome of competition for mates, but it 'is a far cry from it being scientifically demonstrated.'

She pointed out the study's results suggest that maintaining one's appearance in the face of adversity, might be a stronger motivation than the desire to attract a mate and it would be valuable to repeat similar research with older married women. 

In the paper Boosting Beauty in an Economic Decline: Mating, Spending, and the Lipstick Effect, which was published last month researchers from Texas Christian University, University of Minnesota, University of Texas at San Antonio and Arizona State University, presented five studies.

Following evolutionary theories,Sarah Hill, co-author of the study said:'We may not consciously think we’re buying them to make ourselves more desirable to men. 

'But our lizard brains go after these things even when we think we’re too smart to be lured in by manipulative advertising claims like, ‘these jeans will help get you a man.’ 

For the study 154 university students including 82 women and 72 men were presented with fictitious articles highlighting the recession.

The participants were then asked if the content caused them to think there were fewer physically attractive suitors available with a steady job and income and the majority answered 'yes'.

The participants were then asked, based on their gender, about their desire to purchase six products.

Three products enhanced physical appearance including two fashion items and a lipstick for women and facial cream for men. The other three products were a wireless mouse, stapler and headphones. 

While men's purchasing desires were not effected, women in the recession condition demonstrated a 'significant interaction between priming condition and product type' opting for products that would enhance their appearance.

Defending the findings Vlad Griskevicius, one of the co-authors of the paper from the University of Minnesota argued that the work was 'grounded in theory about universal human nature rather than cultural stereotypes', although he admitted that further research is needed.