In 2024 we saw Brat vibes thrive, AI expand its remit as both a preternaturally brilliant ally and an all-the-buttons-pushing agitator and luxury shift on an increasingly creaky axis, among many other things. In the wake of a devastatingly tough year for many, what sociocultural shifts, emerging mentalities and/or nuggets of techno-gold will shape 2025 for retail and marketing? And how to meet them with meaningful, longevity-cultivating, forward-thinking responses?
From underconsumption and strategic indulgence to resilience-centring retail, synthetic sidekicks and the value of incubating ‘joy divisions’ here are 9-ish key predictions and strategic avenues via which to get ahead, step up for your fans and thrive in 2025.
1: Underconsumption & Strategic Indulgence
Pause preconceptions regarding underconsumption being overblown TikTok trend #9817671. Thanks to continued economic jitters, anxieties about planet-decimating overproduction and the grubby residue of unchecked impulse purchasing (retail hangxiety, if you will), cleverly curbing spending in ways that not only don’t scream frugal but actually present a way to clamber out of personal micro chaos will be an opportunity hive in 2025.
Less about ‘anti-new’ and more about ‘less crass’, AI will be a massive boon here due to its capacity for ‘techno benevolence’ – circumventing bad choices right as they’re cusping – and the seductive glow of the quantified self (higher self-knowledge). See Restyle, a virtual wardrobing e-commerce app helping users style their existing clothes and recommending “individual additions, not entirely new outfits”; Open Wardrobe, which can reveal garments’ estimated cost per wear; and fintech app newbie Parthean which devours receipt data to auto-flag follow-up brand offers and custom-create goal-setting programmes.
Counterintuitive as it would have once seemed, supermarket Tesco is now talking up ‘the nudge factor’ to win a long-haul loyalty game; it’s boosting the status of its rewards programme with AI that alerts shoppers to their own repeatedly money-gobbling decisions.
Also look to the adjacent rise of ‘strategic indulgence’ (previously referred to as Asset Culture Commerce) centring on buying items to rent, resell and trade – sometimes in combination. See By Rotation (a “social network for lending and buying fashion”) whose founder & CEO Eshita Kabra-Davies told the FT Future of Retail Summit 2024 that it’s seeing increasing numbers of people “repeat-rent an item, then list it themselves which means they eventually bought it. It’s strategic consumption.”
2: Synthetic Sidekicks, Colliding Realities
Consumer sentiment towards AI – invasive vs. assistive vs. humanity going to hell in an (artificially generated) handbag – fluctuates globally but new figures flag increasing flirtation: 53% of people globally now think AI will help companies better serve consumers. In 2025, it will open the door to deeper human-synthetic alliances, a more intimate world of ‘servicescapes’, and challenge the once-immutable parameters of brand authenticity.
Chatbots will upgrade via ultra-naturalised language tools – Virgin Money’s Redi has seen serious success from a monthly schooling in regional dialects and unusual colloquialisms but also expect greater acceptance of omnipresent ‘shadow’ pals – from the pocket tutors of Soul Machines, to the embodied avatars of AI gaming engine InworldAI whose long-term memory features mean characters (including salespeople or digital ambassadors) can bond with players, or consumers, across multiple sessions. Rumour has it that at least one UK ecommerce giant is currently toying with such a ‘persistent interface’.
Multimodal XR AI agents (audio, visual, text input-output) embedded into phones, headsets and smart glasses capable of ‘reading’ our immediate environment, and hooking into our personal info, will also take deeper root thanks to formats people actually look decent in (see Meta’s collab with Ray-Ban) and support vital moves to better serve disabled people.
Online, authenticity really isn’t what it used to be; a lack of conventional ‘realness’ is no longer a deal-breaker when it comes to purposeful connections. Expect a collision of realities as young netizens in particular lean into life side by side with semi-autonomous synthfluencers – from fully authorised pop star clones (see AI FKA Twigs) to the backstory-bearing avatars of Instagram-esque AI social network Butterflies who, via varying degrees of human puppeteering, interact with both their human and synthetic peers, generating content and engaging in online chat. The brand etiquette? Focus on convincing-but-transparent artifice.
3: Joy(conomy) Divisions
Expect the joyconomy to ramp up in 2025. A counter to consistently bleak news cycles and a maelstrom of modern anxieties, the premium placed on happiness is soaring as measure of success.
Early to the table, Ulta has already broadened the scope of beauty retail as an agent of self-care with the inception of its council of “inspirational joy advocates” (including Deepak Chopra) to helm it’s rolling Joy Project – online content and cultural programming, including an installation during Milan Art & Design Week 2024 – to reverse the official “joy deficit plaguing American teens and adults”.
The continuance of kidulting and tonally-sensitive homages to bonkers extravagance represents a core splinter faction of this trend (85% of consumers globally are keen to incorporate more playtime into their lives) hence the rise of playable brand destinations (ref. Selfridges Sportopia and Vans new skate-ramp-including-store in London) alongside the rise of adult play spaces – see Ballie Ballerson and for extra, tangential fun, artist CJ Hendry’s 50m inflatable Public Pool in the heart of the Nevada desert…
To note: while kitsch-tastic and nostalgic concepts (the trend for kitschmassy Festive campaigns in 2024 were a love letter to this appetite for affordable, sometimes retina-singeing tacky excess) certainly hold a self-soothing modality (the desire for the ‘pre-plugged in’ era has never been stronger) focus on reinstating presence – helping people perceive themselves as at heart of the action (alive, alert, edified, undistracted) to add depth to the temporary escape.
For further reading see new book The Bright Side by Sumit Paul-Choudhury, former editor-in-chief at the New Scientist, described by speechwriter & To Sell is Human author Dan Pink as “transforming optimism from a soft-hearted notion into a hard-headed advantage”.
4: Super Sonic Branding
Previously underrated audio-centring concepts, aka sonic branding, will also present major 2025 wins – grabbing audiences by ‘the feels’ and delivering solace from the perils of blanding (84% of consumers globally say they buy from brands they feel an emotional connection to, and 63% want more multisensory experiences from brands).
It’s already visible in the ‘emotioneering’ of ‘scenographic’ store concepts/activations from mega-brands seeking to shake off the shackles of a corporate shadow – in Gucci’s case, specifically Gucci Cosmos, amplified via a supplementary audio guide and additional content. Also, immersion rooms – see the Bentley Cube, Seoul, which sonically replicates the sensation of luxuriating inside a Bentley in motion.
Elsewhere, new royalty-free, artist-approved AI image-to-music tools like Mubert and Epidemic Sound (“translate a feeling that’s uniquely yours”) are unlocking ways for brands and creators to soundtrack their online presence, while ‘audio-scaping’ experts such as Treble are aurally elevating the verisimilitude of virtual worlds.
Products and product packaging will become a window onto rolling programmes of exclusive content – see precursor Balenciaga’s use of a digital product passport (DPP) to unlock music, and/or – as the cognitive economy booms – soundtracks specifically to boost mood or cognitive health. For more on the latter see Resilience-Centred Commerce below…
5: Resilience Centred Brand Bonding
Resilience messaging was rife post-pandemic amid the desperation to regroup but in 2025 expect success from concepts and tools that big up the buoyancy rhetoric in ways that are both pragmatic and spirited, and in areas as diverse as wellbeing, climate change and even cybercrime.
Functional fragrance brand Øthers recently released a subscription-based, scent and sound synchronising ‘resilience platform’ where users choose a scent and it’s corresponding soundtrack to suit emotional need, on a promise of heightened cognitive performance and improved mood regulation. More externally pragmatic, skincare brand Pour Moi’s ecommerce site has an interactive map detailing regionalised climate-resilient solutions in real-time, while real-estate marketplace Zillow has just introduced data from First street, which provides climate risk financial modelling, on all its US listings.
For telco, the pursuit of crushing cybercrime is looking more ingenious by the minute – see 02’s AI granny (aka Daisy), trained in partnership with software engineer Jim Browning. The zenith of Obstructive Old Dear engineered to cause maximum exasperation, she dispatches phone scammers in mere minutes by nattering to them, in brilliantly rambling fashion, until they’re comprehensively bored into submission.
6: Collective Connective: Squad Shopping Steps Up
Echoing the appetite for a resocialised social media and dovetailing with section #3 (Joy Divisions) also expect wins in 2025 from collective-connecting tech and physical spaces that galvanise communal bonds.
Countering AI-powered retail’s potential to turbocharge hyper-individualism (if generative AI equals me-tail on a massive scale it’s also a filter bubble on steroids) look to tools like Walmart’s Shop with Friends app feature (AI plus AR) devised for sharing virtually trialled outfits across social platforms or email, or J.Crew’s Virtual Closet app for the Apple Vision Pro (AVP) XR headset offering in-world group video chat with mates. While the AVP itself might be on borrowed time more mingle-ready e-comm has ultra-long legs. Also networked, see AI-fuelled US travel planning app Pilot (tagline: “Collab with your squad to design your dream trip”) which neatly plugs into the pleasures of collaborative, creative organisation.
Also note the incoming Roblox-related retailtainment boosts that warrant the metaverse being reinserted into brands’ roadmaps. In 2025 look out for Netflix’ in-Roblox digital content playground Nextworld, including The Streamship, a virtual screening spot where users can join watch parties, and ‘Fan Pods’ – closed social spaces where gamers can hang with friends). A partnership with Shopify will mean that from as early as Q1 brands and partner creators will be able sell (physical) items direct from the platform.
In IRL environments look to new drop-in or customisation culture-nurturing serving as vital youth-centric hangouts like Casetify in Seoul or Rebel in Melbourne but also, physicalising the burgeoning proliferation of fandoms, supersized fan experiences like Netflix House – the streamer’s first permanent (mall-ensconced) theme parks and branded experiences opening this year.
7: Leveraging Brand Lore, Myth and ‘Nerd Centres’
Sentiment towards brand heritage is complex and conflicted: historical heft as a bewitching superpower or tired out narratives reeking of irrelevance? Notably, 49% of Gen Z globally believe luxury brands should break from heritage and become more future-focused. But in an age of perceived blanding fuelled (particularly in fashion) by a revolving door of creative directors, leveraging core pockets of brand mythology and fandom-beloved lore will drive both the spectacle and sense of belonging audiences seek. Fan clubs, effectively surrogate families – especially for the Very Online – have always needed a consistent supply of storylines to pick apart and rumours to digest, with the magic of pop cultural rabbit holes and detail-devouring ‘nerd centres’ making it possible to be a brand who does both.
For instance, McDonald’s much-praised 2024 WcDonald’s campaign showed exactly how to give the fans what they actually want via a (temporary) 30-market brand transformation involving food packaging, stores and mini-films that paid homage to the term anime fans had been applying to its McDonald’s imitating restaurants for decades in-game.
Archives – innate portals to mystique and hidden intelligence – will hold plenty of allure, too: perfumer Ffern sells quarterly single edition ‘drops’ to clients on its ‘ledger’ which, while never-to-be-repeated, can be revisited in its London store’s archive room; H&M has had ex-British Vogue editor Kate Phelan “curate and recontextualise” eight drops from its Pre-Loved archive – a limited edit of several hundred pre-loved pieces from the first 20 years of it designer collection collabs; while fashion designer Norma Kamali has been pioneering a new era of succession planning: see her collaboration with creative agency Maison Meta on an AI copilot, trained on her 40-year archive, to enshrine the very bones of her creative philosophy into all the brand’s future design thinking.
AI is already proving a powerful alchemist regarding transmuting mythology for modern viewing. See Florida’s (Salvador) Dali Museum’s Ask Dalí feature, which invites visitors to converse with an ‘AI Dalí’ via an on-site telephone – a concept transferrable to any brand icon, figurehead or even ambassador.
8: Activism Reanimated: Toolkits for Divisive Times
Politics is a thorny space for brands to get stuck into – according to Havas Media Network’s Year of the Elections survey 2024 more people (41%) think that brands shouldn’t be involved in politics than should (28%) – but divisive and destabilising times will call for brands with the balls to be show themselves as more than commodity machines. Consider it everyday activism anchored in acknowledgement, self-preservation and edifying intellectual steers.
Tapping America’s state of the nation anxiety (55% say they’re often or mostly angry about politics and social injustice), see footwear brand Miista’s NY Rage Room – a staging of the world’s most-depressing office which, post a filmed performance piece, fans could get unapologetically destroy.
Less theatrical, look to the boom in bibliophilic brand concepts. Echoing the misogyny-deflecting (“male gaze avoiding”) women-only sanctuaries that are blossoming in Chinese cities see fragrance brand To Summers bookshop-themed Shanghai pop-up inspired by Virginia’ Woolf’s 1929 feminist essay, A Room of One’s Own. The project included publishing Nosepaper – a poetry anthology of women writers. For other biblio-brand ideas see beauty labels Lush and Aesop (the latter for its LGBTQ+ library), and scent labels Documents and Le Labo.
Rather than courting outrage culture, direct lines to resources are what it’s all about. See mediation app Headspace’s launch of a Politics Without Panic toolkit and guides to survive confrontational conversations without irrevocably alienating a member of your family.
9: The best of the Rest…
As a New Year’s bonus ball, here’s an assorted mix of other key sectors to keep an eye on/delve into.
Expect/deliver smarter, more nuanced iterations of marketing surrounding motherhood. Look to the furore regarding Burger King’s 2024 ‘Foodfilment’ campaign showing real and non-staged British mothers tucking into a dirty burger immediately post-partum as a key marketing example. Comments veered from appreciation of a brand keeping it ultra-real to a ban-demanding backlash for promoting unhealthy maternal eating habits (notably most women commenters surmised that going through the beautiful hellscape of labour warrants permission to eat whatever food you damn well like).
It’s going to be another big year for women’s sports (the soccer Euros will be major summertime viewing) offering another major opportunity to back a huge growth area in a not-yet-saturated market – via retail, gaming and marketing collabs that a.) pose better future scenarios, not just reflect reality, b.) show guts, grit and entertainment instead of solely hackneyed tales of adversity and c.) plug into grassroots voices including online soccer fandoms.
Finally, the rebranding of retirement as traditional markers of key life stages become increasingly unfit for purpose. Treat age appropriateness as an anachronism.
