Exactly. Unless your brand is in trouble or you are trying to deflect the attention from some sort of scandal the odds of losing existing customers from a successful business is far higher than the odds of attracting new customers because you have changed your packaging.

For most products, you have the choice of multiple companies Y that make/sell said product. Some might differentiate themselves on reducing their packaging. In other cases, you might be able to reduce your packaging impact by buying said product used or (god forbid) going without something you want but don't need.

That's pretty fascinating to see that you're reading literally everything backward, like not only the real world around you but even what I'm writing! I'm talking about the fact that nobody is offering the possibility to buy stuff that's not wrapped (and for legit business reasons, it's much easier on their supply-chain management to do so this way), and you're interpreting as if the problem was on the demand side.

And everything is in the same vein: I'm talking about a situation where the supply side is definitely not providing what the consumer want, at least a significant fraction of the population, and you insist in arguing as if plastic packaging was driven by consumer demand: it is not it's cost saving and supply chain ease of use on the supply side, not demand. And that's why you can't find any: why would a business bother doing what the customer want when they can get away with costs savings because customers have nowhere to go.

> Meaning that if I decide to keep my clocks on a constant schedule, it's straight to jail for me?

Chances are that you'll straight up lose your job after a couple days. Then you'll see how your freedom not to change your clock time is respected when you're being evicted because you could not pay your rents due to lack of revenue. By the way that's a good illustration of the difference between freedom in a vacuum, and the actual exercise of freedom in a socially interconnected world where your agency is in fact very constrained by material factors.

> If the state is democratic, the people have to coordinate first. Without such coordination, there is no way for democracy to take place.

Fascinatingly steady with backward-driven thinking indeed! You can't have democracy if you don't have a state entity that's able to run the elections and enforce them. The democratic character of the state comes later, once the people already in charge have been confirmed through the election, or when they decided to step down if they lose. Coordination comes from the state, which can then replicate itself thanks to this coordination. No state started with an election, at the very beginning was always somebody getting power through other means (be it a foreign invader, a previously ruling king, or a group of insurrectionist).

> Laws are useful for keeping the minority dissenters in line with the will of the majority, but in this case once the majority has stopped buying plastic-wrapped food, it is highly unlikely there will be a compelling business case to serve the small handful of people who want to see the world burn.

But without enforcement, nobody will ever be able to buy such food, because nobody has an incentive to sell it in the first place. It's cheaper to sell plastic wrapped food, and because the externalities come for free, the business isn't paying the cost of their behavior. Buyers, or at least a significant fraction of it, realize the cost, but they don't have any leverage on the business because there's nowhere to go. The same way I'm not buying a smartphone that's being manufactured in my country, because there isn't any.

> Laws are useful for keeping the minority dissenters in line with the will of the majority

Not only. Laws are also setting the state budget, the tax levels or food and drugs safety standards, your interpretation of what law is supposed to do is indeed very limited in comparison to what it actually is in the real world.

> he previous commenter's idea of a higher power forcing the people to bend to his will is great and all, but doesn't work with democracy.

No, there's no non-democratic high power in charge up there, it's just a matter of democratic state intervening to fix a market imperfection (negative externalities), but in your now infamous skill to misinterpret everything, you managed somehow invented some authoritarian power in the discussion. Well done.

Maybe you could try reading what other people are writing twice before commenting, or maybe three or four times, just to be sure you're not making things up in your head, because that's a recurring theme at that point.

Edit: oh I found this gem in another comment of yours (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39783570)

Not sure why would you would choose to reply before reading the comments

The irony is absolutely delicious.

I somewhat agree with this, especially when we are talking about higher brand companies appeasing cheaper consumables.

However, the other way around, it can be done effectively. Take for IKEA instance. They made inroads into Europe and American homes, and did it by offering cheaper, well-designed and modern alternatives made of particle board. After seeing some customers wanted higher-quality products with the same design aesthetic, they introduced a sliding scale of products from cheap-and-cheerful, to better constructed, yet still flatpacked materials.

Customers could then choose the desired range and quality on a sliding scale for each product. This model seems to have worked well for them.

This is a little unfair on "consumers". I don't have a choice in how my local supermarket packages its products. I bring my own containers to the butcher, I bring my own bags for fruit and veg, and we still end up with at least one bin worth of waste every week. That's not counting the packaging that the products are shipped to my local stores in either.

Consumers aren't lazy, companies are cheap. it's cheaper to wrap something in LDPE + friends, and transport it across <insert landmass here>, then force the consumer to pay to dispose of it (and their local authority to bear the brunt of managing it), than it is for the manufacturer to make it closer and get it to me without shrink wrapping.

Until suppliers, manufacturers, retailers are held responsible, consumers are _not_ the lazy ones, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't still try.

At the same time greater effectiveness or the sham appearance of same of recycling or reduction decreases pressures on the packaging industry and those selling goods utilising them, but actually makes the practice more attractive vs. sustainable or less polluting alternatives.

And the message resonates through simplicity and guilt, and advertising budgets. Just because a model is simple and transmits readily does not mean it is correct.

I wish.

What’s being resold and repackaged is telling other people how to make money by telling other people how to tell other people how to make money by telling other people how to make money.

Don't you see that is the problem? We have trademark laws to protect companies from confusing consumers. E.g. If a cola company comes even close to confusing a consumer that their product is 'coke' then it gets sued.

However, when consumers are routinely confused by what's in a product or have become so accustomed that the picture on the box is not actually what is in the box then this audience seems to think that is okay.

I find the difference in opinions between business protection and consumer protection astounding. We've been massively propagandized by capitalism.

Laundry detergent companies have actually been spending billions in ads over multiple decades to manipulate you into caring about it though.

> That said, businesses absolutely hate this, which is why you see all kinds of methods being applied to uncommodify goods

Exactly.

You don't have to buy stuff you don't want.

You just can't buy the stuff you do want without it being bundled with stuff you don't want - the manufacturers have decided there's no market for it.

Evidently it's more profitable to persuade a large fraction of people that they are “consumers”, whose lives are a series of branded commercial experiences, than it is to cater to the unlucrative number of people who object.

As ever, the problem is consumerism.

You're right in that trends aren't arbitrary, but you've jumped from that idea to the idea that consumer needs are the reason. That's not the case. A large proportion of the time the reason why a particular trend is set isn't 'consumers want this'. It's 'the commodities to make this product are going to be particularly cheap this season - so margins should be healthy'. The McRib is a great example.

As a crystal clear example, do you think any consumer in their right mind wants their products shrinkflated? Do you think misleading packaging is based on satisfying consumer desires, or manipulating them?

The competition is for dollars, not for goodwill.

That's not the only reason. Consumer convenience can also be a factor why things are done in a certain way.

Status quo bias is also huge, especially since consumers will be more difficult to change than a handful of companies.

Also, new technology, such as cheaper and more accurate sensors, scales, printers, anti-theft tech, etc. may make something more feasible when it might not have been even a few months ago.

Finally, consumer preference and education are also important. Zero waste buying, for example, would require consumers to (a) recognize there is massive waste in their lives, (b) recognize alternative ways are possible, (c) be willing to change to the alternative way, which they might resist even if it's better. For most companies, the cost/risk of this education may not be worth it. But it's possible that there is far greater awareness among consumers about (a) and (b) today than ever before, so the costs are now feasible.

It's like this because it is an overwhelming benefit to someone who is selling something. Not because it is necessarily overwhelmingly what people want.

Some other market outcomes I'm unhappy with: ad tracking, excessive plastic packaging, cheap goods - expensive repairs, all sodas are at least twice as sweet as they need to be.

When there are options, I choose otherwise. If an option I've come to rely on changes to be something I don't prefer - i'll raise a stink.

I think you are implying that we should socialise losses - informing ourselves is not free. We don't want to become specialists in understanding paperwork. Expecting individuals to invest time to learn how to make the perfect consumer decision is just unworkable. Making complex tradeoffs between conflicting requirements is an expensive and time-consuming process.

A11y: informing ourselves is not accessible. Not everyone is an engineer/economist type that is good at making complex tradeoffs.

I know that I use some gross heuristics and simplifications when making significant purchases (even though I have some training and natural bent towards product analysis).

I think GP was downvoted because he criticized consumer activism and not just what he meant to criticize: Making change by purchasing decisions. I've generally switched to his perspective. For about a decade I felt (and acted) more like you. That experience taught me how poor a strategy it is. The success stories via boycotts are a fairly small minority. Most attempts at change via boycotts fail. It's incredibly hard even to start one.

A lot of shaming is involved, and it rarely works. People don't like to feel ashamed. As he said in his response to you, it does quickly degrade to infighting amongst consumers and a lot of energy is wasted there that could be used in alternative strategies.

It requires people to be very knowledgeable, and I saw mostly failures even amongst highly educated folks. To understand an issue, connect all the dots, etc takes a lot of effort. Most people want someone else (government agency, consumer watchdog, etc) to do all the work.

That's not to say broad media campaigns are a bad idea - I think they are necessary. But much more often than not, companies will win on the purchasing decisions battle.

Danish brewer Carlsberg says its research suggests paper bottles could attract more female drinkers, and find a home in upscale establishments. Pepsi says paper could better communicate the natural ingredients in its smoothies and juices. L’Oréal thinks the ability to emboss paper could help its hand creams stand out on shelves.

The conclusion I came away with is that this is largely a marketing exercise. Although they may be able to eventually come up with a suitable product, it seems at least as likely that this will end up being a very costly virtue signal. I'll pass.

I'll reckon a guess: most companies aspire to differentiate themselves and retain customers by building brands.

The alternative is race-to-the-lowest-price commodification and continual, cutthroat competition.

I'm not understanding what the paradox is here. This seems intuitive to me.

It's worth noting that one of the main reasons consumers "don't care" is the market is structured in a way to literally numb them to these issues. It makes it difficult to even learn about these issues (in relation to particular products), have that knowledge when making a purchasing decision, and take action against it (all competitors may be doing the same thing). The PR you mentioned also plays a part.

To give an slightly different example: Xinjiang produces a lot of cotton, and, IIRC, some of it is produced through forced labor. How am I supposed to show I care by avoiding that cotton? I can't, because it's pretty much impossible for me to know if a particular shirt I'm buying is made from that cotton or not, and it might actually be impossible for anyone to know without a very expensive and time consuming investigation.

If Apple put up big signs in it's stores saying "iPhones are made with forced labor," with compelling product storytelling about the forced labor practices involved, I think you'd Apple's sales drop as consumers show they do care. But that's not going to happen, all the market incentives are to obscure that kind of information.