Mitch Blum

Please make sure that you visit The Hub Magazine to read my article on private label vs. national brands and then come back here if you have any comments or questions.  Here’s a preview:

When it comes to cultural trends, the only thing that Americans love more than embracing new ones is declaring the death of old ones. I’d use the wonderful phrase “jumped the shark” to describe this phenomenon (John Hein’s term for identifying the point where things pass their peak, named after the Happy Days episode in which a leather-jacket-clad Fonzie water skied over a shark), but in all honesty, “jumped the shark” itself jumped the shark quite a few years ago.

This phenomenon, however, isn’t just limited to cultural trends and television shows. Everything from political parties to media vehicles are constantly being declared “over.” Eight years ago, the Democrats were deemed irrelevant while today the Republicans are being declared D.O.A. Television was supposed to replace radio, while the internet was going to kill off newspapers. (Okay, that last one might still turn out to be true.)

One of the more notable occurrences during our Great Recession has been the explosive growth of private labels. Sales and purchase intent of private labels have been growing exponentially, with no end in sight. The temptation, naturally, is to seize upon this latest trend as a sign of the end of brands.

It’s a new era! Brands are dead! The age of brands is over!

I’m not so sure about that.