If you wanted to buy something new, before the rise of Instagram and other related social media apps, you’d probably head to the mall with a group of friends and make an entire day out of it, window shopping at the expensive stores you couldn’t afford and stopping for food court delicacies. But now, just about anything one could need is accessible with the click of a button or a swipe on a digital screen. Of course this has made many lives easier, especially in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, but it has also subliminally changed our perception of the shopping experience and the way we consume material items. You cannot just leave the mall and forget about the pricey silk shirt that caught your eye - now it follows you through curated advertisements on every social media app. This has led to a dangerous ideology in which consumers are never actually finished consuming. Let me explain how this works.
I remember the first time I saw a curated ad on Instagram. I was shopping on the Free People website in my browser - adding things to my cart that I was too indecisive to actually purchase - before switching to the Instagram app to scroll through my feed. There it was, the same shirt I had added to my cart in my browser, now being paraded in front of me as if it were saying aloud, “Buy me! Buy me!”. I did not fully understand back then that this was no coincidence. All of the social media apps we know and love collect browser information and take cues from the accounts and brands we interact with online to create ads that almost seem like they came from our own minds. I have fallen into this trap before, purchasing something I did not need just because an ad popped up on my feed, and I know I am not the only one. That is the sole purpose of these advertisements.
Some may look at these facts and say, “So what? My social media aligns more with my interests - how is that a bad thing?” The fact of the matter is, it is a really smart marketing tactic. The more we blur the lines between reality and virtuality, the more the Internet becomes an integral part of our everyday lives. Furthermore, blurring those lines can lead to some threatening mindsets when it comes to consumerism. Our generation is facing an extreme environmental crisis, and one of the biggest sources of our environment’s detriment is the way our society is prone to overconsumption. With influencers parading a new outfit every day on Instagram, product placement in Tik Tok’s, and certain apps adding marketplaces to their interfaces - such as Facebook - it is hard to feel like the things you do already have are enough.
Aside from facilitating extreme amounts of consumption, the Internet and social media have also changed the ways in which we shop. We do not even have to physically go to the store anymore; the store can be brought to us. Apps like Instacart and Amazon boast a wide array of products and lightning speed delivery. This is beneficial for those who may not be able to travel to the nearest convenience store or who were immobilized due to the pandemic. But changing the ways we shop also opens the door for shoppers to be taken advantage of in ways that were not possible before. Let’s look at the app Depop as an example. As a thrifty shopper, I perceive Depop in a very positive light. It is an app in which shoppers can buy and sell their used clothing items for discounted pricing. In simpler terms, it is virtual thrift shopping. Many of the marketplace sellers on Depop list their items at fair prices and donate a percentage of their profits to charitable organizations. Here are just a few examples of exemplary sellers:
Eliza Batten - @elizabatten
Kelly Ruane - @goldlink_
Vivian's Shop - @viviancabbage
On the other hand, lots of other Depop vendors are not as generous. There are many sellers on Depop who will list an item as vintage, allowing them to jack up the prices on a commodity almost 3 to 4 times its normal price. I like to call this phenomenon “Colonizing Secondhand Fashion”. Secondhand or thrifted fashion is meant to be accessible to all, and by making it ridiculously expensive, sellers are straying from the original intentions of the Depop app. These are just some of the dangers among many of shopping within a virtual world.
Like many things in the online world, there are complex nuances to the online shopping experience. Surely it is great the way technology has been able to improve our lives and make a sometimes mundane task immeasurably easier. But, there are implications that come along with shopping moving to the Internet and being integrated within our social media. It is imperative to be conscious of our consumption in a world where it is now so easy to consume, and to make sure we are making smart shopping decisions whether in person or virtually.