Every so often a new ad sparks widespread hot takes, and last week it was Jaguar’s turn. Allow us to cut through the noise to help outline why Jaguar might have gone so bold: while it’s the car brand Brits are most likely to call “heritage”, only 4% want to buy one. As Rory Sutherland puts it: “I want it to exist, but I’m not going to participate”.
Scroll down to read about credit cards, clusters, and the AI art Turing Test.
Stats to power your week
💳 The number of 18-24 year olds who own a credit card is up 25% since 2017, another sign that Gen Z might be more comfortable with credit than the millennials who grew up in the shadow of the post-2008 financial crisis. GWI Core (UK & US)
🎵 Fun fact: Right now, more music is being released daily than the total number of tracks released in 1989. Younger consumers are taking advantage, with 1 in 5 Gen Z and millennials considering themselves to be music or audio creators. GWI Core
⚽ Women’s sports are taking center stage, but there’s still much to understand about their fans. Consider this: almost every single women’s sport competition has a mostly male audience. GWI Sports
🛍️ Officially, Black Friday is this week – though for many of us, it’s been in the background for much of November. Looking at our data, influencers might be keeping grandma in mind. Holiday shoppers who follow influencers on social media are 54% more likely than the average to plan on buying gifts for their grandparents. GWI Zeitgeist
What’s on our radar
Last week we highlighted a studythat found people actually prefer AI-generated poems, and another (more informal) test has revealed two new findings – one, people aren’t the sharpest at picking out AI-made art, and two, they actually prefer it over art created by humans.
Elsewhere in AI, we’re at an interesting stage where we can observe the early adopters of ChatGPT in an enterprise context – Spanish bank BBVA found an “explosion of creativity”, but still have questions about bottom line impact and scaling. Meanwhile, the City of Buenos Aires is using it to predict judicial rulings.
Kim Kardashian was hanging out with a new friend on Instagram this week – a Tesla Optimus robot – and was also seen in a Tesla-made Cybercab. It’s a brand-influencer collab at the highest level, but it does show that similar robots might make it down to your local IG page in the next few years.
Over 60 million households tuned into the Netflix-streamed Jake Paul-Mike Tyson fight. Next up for the streaming giant are the NFL Christmas games, complete with a Beyoncé appearance that’ll surely boost viewership. Netflix is all in with live sports – ain’t no hold ‘em.
One of our key trends to watch this year was waning consumer interest in veganism, and it’s claimed another casualty with plant-based meal manufacturer Allplants going into administration. But it’s worth knowing with the right marketing, vegan products can still do well – just look at Huel’s recent success.
Speaking of plants – three US states recently voted against legalizing recreational marijuana use. Some say federal legalization is inevitable, but while it’s easy to assume trends organically spread everywhere eventually, they do sometimes hit a wall.
Chart of the week
Some brands have enjoyed a good decade of success so far, with TikTok, ChatGPT, and HOKA being some of the fastest-growing and best-known. But here’s one that might’ve slipped your attention – Nerds. Since 2020, there’s been a 56% rise in Americans calling it their favorite candy brand, a testament to the viral power of its Gummy Clusters product.
It’s a great case study that asks that age-old question: what makes a product become suddenly popular? A shoutout from Kylie Jenner always helps, and maybe its crunchy-chewy texture is a good fit in our ASMR-friendly world.
But then again, perhaps not – our data shows Nerds are becoming more popular among some unexpected groups, including 55-64 year olds, Arizona residents, and skilled manual workers. Social media virality might be one thing, but growth often happens in places you weren't anticipating.
Local lowdown
From country house to Kuala Lumpur
In 2006, the International Badminton Federation moved its headquarters from Cheltenham (not far from the country house that gives the sport its name) to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia. It’s a move that represents the sport’s history – it was invented by the British aristocracy, exported via colonial officers in Asia, and is now one of the most popular sports in Malaysia today.
The sport’s popularity is helped by the low cost of equipment, making it a favorite at gyms, parks, and schools throughout the country. While recent success helps (11 of the country’s 15 Olympic medals came from the sport), the Badminton World Federation (BWF) has done a great job of appealing to young people, and Gen Z in Malaysia show higher-than-average interest in following and playing the sport.
The BWF website livestreams matches, making it easy to watch badminton anywhere in the world, it has accounts dedicated to giving play-by-play updates, and its Instagram page has 2 million followers. Malaysians are also the most likely in the world to watch short videos (<10 mins) on their mobiles, and having plenty of content to watch keeps hardcore and casual fans alike engaged.
