I was born in 1995; the year of Clueless, Kate and Johnny and The Macarena. 1995 was the last of the birth years for Millennials and the start of a new generation; Generation Z. I was born on the cusp of each generation, so what am I? Am I a ‘narcissistic’ and ‘entitled’ millennial? Or am I a pluralist Gen Z-er, motivated to change the world? Do I lose concentration, quicker than I can even type the word ‘attention’, because of my Gen Z ‘highly developed, 8-second filter’? Or is it because I am in a state of shock that I didn’t get a trophy for showing up in the first place? Which stereotype am I? Does it even matter?
The influence that a generation can over the fashion industry is genuinely huge. So huge, in fact, that it can only be compared to the influence that Rachel Green had on haircuts in 1994. Huge. Millennials practically invented fast fashion; they wanted new clothes and they wanted them cheap and often. This changed the face of the high street forever, wiping out whichever retailers couldn’t keep up with the pace. I’m also holding Millennials solely responsible for the alarming popularity of Ugg Boots in the early noughties – only something with as high a level of influence as a whole generation could achieve such a feat.
So, what hoops does the fashion industry need to jump through to satisfy Generation Z?
Generation Z are digital natives; they have lived their whole lives with the internet. The oldest Gen Z-ers have lived almost half of their lives with iPhones! They speak fluently in a completely new language of emojis, hashtags and GIFs and their Instagram accounts are likely one of their most precious possessions. They care less about material items and more about exciting experiences. Everyone is their own brand. They are aware of what they’re being sold at any given time and do not appreciate the blatancy of product plugs. Authentic experiences are to Generation Z what immediacy was to Millennials.
Bloggers used to be the key to authenticity – back when being a blogger meant spending Saturday night at your family desktop computer, typing up a gushing review of Maybelline Dream Matte Mousse – however blogging is now an industry of its own, with its biggest success stories earning hundreds of thousands of pounds a year. Unfortunately for PR teams, the stark rise in a blogger’s salary has a negative correlation with the relatability felt by audiences; is aspiration alone enough to create resonance? According to WGSN, it is not; they say that fashion retailers should prioritise attainability and relatability to ensure that their marketing outputs are resonant with Generation Z.
The relevance of blogs amongst Generation Z has been somewhat diminished by the popularity of mobile. Adam Meshekow, executive vice-president of strategy and national sales at SITO mobile, claims that Generation Z are not mobile-first, like their Millennial predecessors, they are mobile-only. Traditional websites, including blogs, have been deemed as boring and time-consuming whilst apps prevail - who needs Match.com when you have Tinder? Now it is all about social media and influencers.
It is no surprise that Gen Z-ers love social media – everyone secretly has a soft spot for it. Social media is the home to your hilarious-even-when-condensed-into-140-characters commentary on this year’s Love Island, its where you shamelessly post hints to your boyfriend of what you want for your birthday, and, most importantly, the iconic Instagram account @everyoutfitonsatc wouldn’t be here without it. Social media has come along way however from the days of people genuinely using the ‘its complicated’ option on their relationship status. Ask any Gen Z-er and they will tell you that Facebook has been taken over by mums sharing pictures that say things like ‘Share if your daughter is beautiful and you love her!’ which has caused Generation Z to flock to Snapchat, Instagram and Tumblr as fast as they can.
Generation Z’s attention is infamously difficult to grab, and even more difficult to hold. Unlike other social media platforms that battle trying to expand their notoriously short attention span, Snapchat allows users to produce short, ephemeral content that is outlived by their attention span. When it comes to brands, Gen Z-ers are increasingly willing to compromise quality for authenticity, meaning that the highly edited and polished images that the fashion industry is so used to producing are failing to inspire and engage the new age of consumers. Snapchat takes away brands’ ability to produce perfect images – the dog filter is the extent of editing – and offers them a more candid approach to sharing the brand’s activity.
By 2020 Generation Z will account for 40% of all consumers worldwide. They have an existing spending power of $44billion annually, and $600billion influence on family spending. If that isn’t enough for fashion brands to put down the camera, step away from the Photoshop and embrace the face-swap, then I don’t know what is.
