Consumer Zeitgeist Plaforms

1. The Imagination Society:

"In the Imagination Society, we will most generously reward those who can tell stories."

Rofl Jenssen at the Copenhagen Institute for Future Studies

. Valuation of the "idea" behind a "thing": telling a Brand Story, a Product Story, a

Service Story.

. Adventure and experience more valued than ownership.

. Curating an experience: creating a mystic, a ritual, a sense of history.

. Adding emotional values to functional benefits.

. Consumer's appetite for knowledge and back story = consumer engagement = Open

Kitchen.

. Producer + Consumer = Prosumer

. Shift from Consumer Base to Consumer Communities with unique (discreet) identities.

2. The Digital and Mobile Society:

Innovation in mobile technologies and social media and a dramatic increase in digital activities around the world have elevated Digital as a key pillar of the Brand Strategy and Business Strategy.

"The world as a Retail Experience: anywhere, anytime, anything"

Patrick Moorehead: Director of Emerging Media, Chicago

. Always on / always connected (Living Online): shift from Internet Natives to Internet Immigrants

. Digital technology (Living Online) enables community formation by creating common denominators while allowing for "local" differences.

. Digital technology (Living Online) enables interchanges and exchanges between subcultures. It is accelerated by new media and increasing mobility.

. Digital Technology (Living Online) enables "Being Someone" while "Belonging" - urge for self expression in the context of a discreet tribe.

3. The Urbanomics Society:

A large Urbane audience is up for brands that challenge, thrill, entertain, inspire and even shock. At the very least, brands need to show some personality and character.

"Risky? Yes! But not as risky as being bland."

Reiner Evers: Trendwatching.com

.The hundreds of millions (and growing!) of experienced and sophisticated urbanites, from San Francisco to Shanghai to São Paulo, who are ever more demanding and more open-minded, but also more proud, more connected, more spontaneous