The Graveyard of Microtrends: They Lived Fast and Died Young

Hi, it's Marielle here.

Thank you all for gathering here today to pay our respects to some dearly departed friends…

The House of Sunny Hockney dress, who will live forever in our hearts and sadly for us, on Depop too. The Jacquemus Le Chiquito bag (and subsequent ASOS dupes) - if these tiny bags left a gargantuan hole in your pocket, then I’m truly sorry for your loss. And finally we say the hardest goodbye, to our dear friend, the Adidas Sambas. Cause of death - the exact moment Rishi Sunak laced them up.

All gone, and hopefully forgotten.

But this bubonic micro-plague is no longer solely targeting individual items, it’s now infecting entire online aesthetics.

‍Blokette or ballet core, clean girl or coquette aesthetic, mob wife or office siren - social media's brain rot branding has allowed these micro-aesthetics to permeate the wardrobes of those chronically online. Meaning the “core-ification” of our taste and visual aesthetic is now as transient as yesterday's Adidas Sambas.

And when left to the mercy of the algorithm, the rapid turnover of these trends has meant their life cycle is being dramatically compressed.

But in today's digital whodunnit, if TikTok is the trend slayer, there’s one clear accessory to their crime.

Their wholesome, unassuming cousin - Pinterest.

‍*Millennial gasps*‍

Pinterest has been our inspiration crutch since 2010 and as such, has amounted 518 million monthly active users. When a new “core” is born online, Pinterest acts as the nursery for it to grow. Churning out endless inspiration images to feed the masses in their unquenchable thirst for ‘office siren inspo pics’. ‍

Yancey Strickler, Founder of Kickstarter, notes that “People used to be born into communities, then found their individuality. Today people are born individuals, then find their communities.” And platforms like Pinterest are compounding these communities or “sub-aesthetics” and making them an attainable, shoppable reality.

Consumers pin, purchase and post these pre-curated looks until (in the words of Miranda Priestly), they "trickle on down till we fish them out of a clearance bin" - and the bin in this instance is TikTok. A wasteland of regurgitated trends to be consumed, copied, and next week, cancelled.

However, as an avid Millennial “pinner”, I cannot ignore the positive effects of Pinterest and pinning as a form of self care is now a widely shared pastime amongst younger demographics.

Laura Montilla, a Gen Z Lab Ambassador at Edelman, notes, "most social media apps are something to avoid when prioritising mental health and wellness. Pinterest is the app that's now seen as investing in your health and creativity."

But, as Pinterest embraces more in app shopping, it’s this self care scrolling that's playing a major role in the overconsumption and saturation of trends.

‍“Passive consumerism” occurs when we buy without conscious decision-making aka scrolling on autopilot. While Pinterest morphs casual scrolling into stealth shopping, TikTok's rapid-fire trend cycles create FOMO-driven purchases. Both platforms have mastered the art of turning passive scrolling into active consumption.

But can you blame us? Pinterest serves us these mouthwatering aesthetics on a platter and with an accelerated pin-purchase user journey, it takes strong will power to not indulge.

A recent Pinterest report revealed that 63% of weekly Gen Z Pinners say they're "always shopping” and although they may not always have immediate plans to buy something, Gen Z users are saving nearly 2.5 times more pins and making 66% more boards than other generations.

And Pinterest has taken note with the platform transforming into a full-funnel solution for brands, with increasingly covert ads embedded into feeds, masquerading as normal images. And as 96% of user searches are unbranded, companies can literally insert themselves into the picture of the latest “core”. This cosy scrolling is fast becoming window shopping for the digital age - where the line between browsing and buying is blurrier than ever.

But users are collectively smelling bullshit at the commercialisation of their once cosy corner of the internet, with the companies push towards e-commerce is giving many people the ick.

‍"Pinterest was the last safe social media platform from ad bombardment. Now I get nothing but ads." This sentiment is echoed by others with comments like “The jump scare of clicking an image and getting redirected cuz you didn’t realise it was an ad”. In fact many people in the comments have now resorted to only scrolling with an ad blocker installed.

However annoying, the increased ad’s are proving effective at turning passive browsers into active customers. Sprout Social reports that “Pinterest ads have been shown to deliver a 2x higher ROAS (return on ad spend) for retail brands than other digital platforms”.

Clearly disliking something doesn't always translate into not using it - especially when I hate so many useful things in life - the tube, autocorrect, Alexa.

So I ask the jury this, in our ongoing investigation into the murder of microtrends is there ever one guilty party? Clearly Pinterest and TikTok play a significant role in the crime, but is the trail of destruction left in their wake a symptom of their greed or our own?

And when we’re all so starved of originality, can we really bite the hand that dresses us? Or, perhaps the real perpetrator of the crime has been a reflection in our screens all along.

‍Marielle Kouroushi Phillips
Community Manager at BeenThereDoneThat

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