Thirty One. / Contributor Twenty Five: Phillip Jackson, Future Commerce
On the American Free Enterprise System, CARLYs, and the Power of Upheavals.
Hey, everybody. As we slowly crawl out of these mental, emotional, and physical holes that COVID-19 and racial inequality have put us in, I have to say that I am even more optimistic about this younger generation that’s marching, learning, and demanding for change. As Dave Chappelle said it best, “The streets speak for themselves.”
Also, leave it to FIFA of all organizations to point out that combatting racism through removing the kneeling ban is due to respecting tolerance and common sense. How on earth are we in a world where it isn’t common sense to respect each other, treat each other, and hold each other as accountable equals??
This young, hungry, and fired-up generation will lead us out.
Today’s contributor is another recent colleague and friend who’s been building some great foundations in the CPG and DTC worlds. We all have an opportunity to teach.
Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Phillip Jackson.
Enjoy!
Phillip Jackson is the Chief Commerce Officer at Something Digital and co-founder of Future Commerce, a retail media research startup. He has a background in engineering and developer relations, but spends most of his time these days helping brands understand their customers, and deliver on their expectations.
A fun fact: I spend most of my free time creating content for the merchant class through Future Commerce, though I enjoy collecting vintage keyboards from the 1960s and 1970s.
What are you currently working on?
I have spent 6 months creating a report entitled “Nine by Nine: 81 Brands Changing Our World.” Future Commerce set out to ask consumers and brand operators to answer the question “what makes a brand meaningful?” and we were surprised by the diversity of answers. It turns out that today, customers care deeply about how brands are making an impact in the world. We believe that brands have the ability to shape our future.
This 8500-word report is the culmination of years of research, and analysis of 287 retail, technology, and DTC brands, which have been nominated by our Future Commerce Expert Network.
We’d love for you to read it on June 15th, and lend your voice to the conversation for this, our inaugural report.
What are you currently excited about?
No matter who you are or where you come from, you have the need to buy goods and services. So I firmly believe that you should be able to engage in commerce with equity and dignity. Likewise, no matter your race, color, or creed, in the United States you have the ability to start a business. The American Free Enterprise System gives us all the ability to create new opportunities for ourselves. We don’t live in a society with a despotic government that picks the winners and losers (yet). At the same time, we as a nation are currently facing the reality that our system is flawed. It will require deep restructuring to fix the issues that are present -- in particular, systemic white supremacy.
At Future Commerce, we believe that commerce is the global connector of people. Therefore, in our world, commerce-centered entrepreneurship is the great agent of change in our world. With our platform, we’re trying to shine a spotlight on brands that are using their power to create a better, more equitable, future for all of us.
What’s a story or article that you're currently thinking about?
I keep thinking about a piece that I wrote back in December, about an emerging Gen Z consumer psychographic. Unlike a demographic, which describes a generation to which a person belongs, a psychographic describes how a person may think. An example of a psychographic that has been widely discussed is HENRY (high earner, not rich yet).
In response to this, we began to think about the antithesis of this consumer, one who has little disposable income but buys premium anyways. This psychographic is called CARLY (can’t afford real life yet). CARLY aligns with brands that are quirky, celebrate inclusivity and diversity, and express gender neutrality. They also prioritize a greater portion of spend on products and services that aim to fulfill self-actualization and community; primarily due to their other Maslowian needs being shared expenses with their roommates or taken care of by their parents.
She celebrates her flaws, shares her feelings openly, is incredibly entrepreneurial, and is socially native.
What’s a product you’re currently obsessed with?
I cannot believe that I’ve become the person who spends $150 on candles. From Diptyque to Le Labo, I am quite literally (by the transitive property) burning money. It’s fascinating to me because I know that it’s irrational. By the same notion, brand itself is irrational. I can’t think of any better expression of the difference between a $150 candle and a $35 candle other than...well, brand.
My recent obsession with candles began last year when I discovered Otherland. This beautiful DTC candlemaker founded by Abigail Stone has the most gorgeous, whimsical website, and the most elegant packaging. The unboxing experience feels like it was created for Youtubers to gush over.
But a $35 candle be damned, it was a gateway drug that unlocked a hidden desire for luxury inside of me. I began purchasing more niche, more boutique candles. I wrote an essay on the irrationality of purchasing something you cannot experience online, and the trust-builders brands use to bridge that gap. Sometimes it’s free shipping, sometimes it’s free returns.
It’s unjustifiable to so love the ritual of burning something so expensive. But it reminds me of the irrationality of the work that we all take part in every day, and in that way, I feel luckier and more privileged than I deserve.
Wild Card: What’s an item you can’t shake your mind off of?
I cannot shake Charles Yu’s April piece in The Atlantic, “The Pre-pandemic Universe Was the Fiction.” Yu writes “Even as our stark new reality becomes clear, it remains hard to accept that ‘normal’ was the fiction.” The Before times were a dream that have now ended, and our collective memory of that time is beginning to fade; in the way that a dream slowly dissipates shortly after waking.
This line was written prior to the worldwide protests following the despicable death of George Floyd at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer:
These assumptions [that life has a meaning] are a luxury. For me, they are a cross product of my intersecting privileges: born in the United States, to professional parents, at a point in history where my life has proceeded, for the most part, through a series of economic booms without major socio- or geopolitical upheavals. Or at least with upheavals far enough removed so as to allow me to feel physically and mentally insulated.
Upheavals are now at our doorstep and we can no longer ignore them. I am born into privilege. As are my children. My life, as hard as it has been to this point, has been full of luxury to expect that it must have meaning and purpose. Life must make sense, right?
I’ve realized that the right, the just, thing to do is to make my purpose to help extend that privilege to others, that their lives, in turn, have meaning and purpose.
~ C O L O P H O N ~
Please send all feedback, both positive and negative, to sumeetshahwork@gmail.com as this project continues to evolve.
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