Welcome to the Sociology of Business. In my last analysis, Turning culture into business’ superpower, I looked into connecting revenue targets with the brand story through retail channel planning, merchandising, marketing, product development, media and audience segmentation. If you are on the Substack, join the chat. With one of the paid subscription options, join Paid Membership Chat, and with the free subscription, join The General Chat on The Sociology of Business WhatsApp group.
Food has been enjoying a status symbol treatment.
Beyond luxury dining, which existed for centuries, luxury fashion has been staging elaborate presentations, advertisements, photoshoots, and consumption scenarios. Freed from actually being eaten, thanks to GLP-1s, food has become iconography, a visual language, a branding tool, a prop, and a backdrop for expression for everyone from individuals to brands. “Status snacks,” foodcore, oyster towers, fashion restaurants and cafes, or Nara Smith cooking in pre-season Chanel food is an identity signal as much as cultural taste.
Being so closely tied to identity (we are what we eat), food is the new canvas for social, economic and cultural signaling. Beyond signaling power of food iconography, there is food substance. A decade ago, in the golden age of GOOP, there was activated charcoal and everything organic; in the golden age of Erewhon, there are celebrity smoothies and Japanese strawberries. Peptides, NAD+ injections, IV drips and other bio-hacks are information fodders as much as our knowledge of where our food came from and how it’s made. It’s not just information that matters now, it’s craftsmanship, artistry, and sensory qualities of food – its literal taste – that make it attractive category for branding.
Some years back, the plant meat has been a thing, until we realized that we didn’t really know how it was made to taste like meat, and how processed it really was, and that it may actually not be better for us.
Most of consumers gave up meat altogether or reverted to animal-based meat, which now also comes in new iteration. Forged is a company that makes non-farmed meat