14/04/2026
Time to face it. I guess we can all pretty much see (or at least we should) that most of the time our purchases aren’t happening because of a real need but rather out of a consumeristic inertia. Most likely, the underlying true necessity we’re trying to satisfy is more about filling that sense of emptiness and absence of meaning. Deep stuff indeed, but this is not the topic of this post.
The issue is rather to realize and act accordingly about the fact that though there is really NO NEED for your new product or service which is, more likely, a revisitation of something that already exists, the crave for meaning, cause and is at its highest levels ever. Ironically (but not so much), although is what everyone is truly craving for, it’s extremely scarce. It’s kinda the holy grail we might not even know we’re actually looking for.
According to the 2026 Edelman , people are inherently expecting businesses, CEOs and Founders to help fill that void. In other words, we’re no longer expecting businesses to produce products and services; we’re asking them to provide a A REASON TO CARE.
I believe we are barely starting to scratch the surface of all this and, however I deem we have not been doing a good job so far, I sense this should improve over the next few years. It has to or many of those brands who won’t be able to provide a sense of purpose beyond the personal or corporate gain, will likely struggle and even go out of business eventually. It’s already happening actually: luxury brands, Benetton, Stefanel… these are just a few examples of internationally renowned brands who have been struggling a lot, frequently even eating up a huge part of their brand equity for not seeing this coming. Or worse, they did see it coming but they thought it wouldn’t affect them. If this hits and can crash huge brands and companies, what do you think it will do to your own business?
I wrote an article about this on my website and why the answer is but one. It’s actually very comforting because in the era to come, your power won’t necessarily be represented by the size of your asset, but rather the size and the extent of your and thinking.
