In a brilliant Substack post, Reggie James, founder, CEO, and designer at Eternal, goes both long and deep with an article titled “Anticipation is Culture.” In broad strokes, it’s about the nature of a society so bedazzled by the thrill of what’s coming that arrival becomes anticlimactic. 

But along the way, I happen to think he’s nailed one of the ad industry’s big smellies: by making “culture” the North Star, we’re selling a form of snake oil that can turn around and bite.

The reasons are far more pragmatic than sexy. As in: costs hella more, like 5 to 7 times more, to acquire a new customer than to resell to the one you have. As in: since repeat purchase is almost entirely driven by satisfaction with the original, anything that undercuts the joy of having is no bueno. As in: brands have to make their bones over time as the sunk cost of acquisition gets amortized.

So, what happens when agencies focus all that time, talent, and energy on “influencing” a culture that puts a premium on the enjoyment of expectation instead of its actuality? You get an industry mainlining the value of the ephemeral and short-lived. 

Exactly what’s happened over the last few years. As honored more and more every awards season.

Or course, you can rightfully point out the societal consequences of an “anticipation culture” are a lot more consequential than misdirected advertising. Alvin Toffler, in his 1970 book “Future Shock” presciently warned about the grim failings of a “throwaway society.”  

And then there’s this right-to-the-bone lift from Mr. James:  

“Perhaps anticipation culture is the wedded partner of instant-gratification culture. It’s the only thing that allows us to microdose the gratification of the object before we have it….All of these, poised in some economic fashion to extract or predict the value of the object and its surrounding machine.” 

But here’s the thing: right here and right inside advertising’s narrow confines we sell short-term expectation at our peril. Or, we sell long-term value and find salvation.