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Culture | Dress code
文化 | 着装规范
英文部分选自经济学人20261008期文化板块
Culture | Dress code
文化 | 着装规范
Why your favourite bakery and coffee shop now sell tote bags
为什么你最钟爱的烘焙店和咖啡店现在会卖托特袋
The business of merchandise is no longer a Mickey Mouse operation
周边商品生意不再是“周边”产业
From tulips and orchids to Beanie Babies and Pokémon cards, human beings are no strangers to manias. But among the strangest is the current craze for mini totes from Trader Joe’s, an American grocery shop. The release on September 30th of the limited-time Halloween bags—which cost $2.99 and are about the size of an iPad—prompted huge queues outside shops across America. Some Trader Joe’s locations have imposed a strict limit on the number of bags per customer. (People do not seem to mind that the totes are too small to be very useful.) Enthusiasts are turning to resale websites, where they are listed for between $20 and a wishful $50,000.
从郁金香到兰花，从豆豆娃玩偶到宝可梦卡牌，人类陷入了一波又一波的抢购热。但其中最奇怪的一类，当属眼下对美国杂货店乔氏超市（Trader Joe’s）迷你托特袋的追捧。9月30日，该店限时发售iPad大小的万圣节托特袋，每个售价2.99美元，这导致全美各地门店外大排长龙。部分乔氏超市门店甚至对每位顾客的购买数量进行了严格限制（人们似乎并不在意这些袋子太小，难以派上用场）。热衷者们正转向二手交易平台，这些袋子在那里标价从20美元到异想天开的5万美元不等。
Merchandise—or “merch”, to use the trendy term—seems to be everywhere, for everything. Oxford Economics, a research firm, estimates that $338bn a year is spent globally on the stuff. (Their rather broad definition includes licensed products, clothing, branded goods and print-on-demand items.) All kinds of companies are peddling such wares, from bakeries and bookshops to household brands and hardware shops. Even tech firms are joining in. Palantir dropped tennis whites adorned with its logo in July. Recently OpenAI launched its first publicly available clothing line. “This is the best way to get bullied in public,” one X user scoffed.
这些衍生商品用时髦的话讲叫“周边”，它们无处不在，万物皆可有“周边”。研究机构牛津经济研究院（Oxford Economics）估计，全球每年在这类东西上的支出达3380亿美元（宽泛的说，包括授权产品、服装、品牌商品和按需印刷品）。从烘焙店、书店到家具品牌店、五金店，各类公司都在兜售这类商品，连科技公司也加入了。7月，帕兰提尔（Palantir）推出了饰有自家标识的白色网球服，OpenAI最近也推出了其首个公开销售的服装系列产品。一位X用户嘲讽道：“想在公众场合被霸凌，最好的办法就是穿它。”
Merch, of course, is not a new thing. It has long been common in three areas. One is children’s products—as any parent who has had to fork out for an Elsa dress or Buzz Lightyear toy will know. Another arena is music. Barclays, a bank, predicted Harry Styles’s fans would splash out £100 ($135) each at the London leg of the singer’s tour this summer. Merch is also a winning source of revenue for sports teams. New York is still awash in blue-and-orange apparel, the colours of the Knicks, the city’s victorious basketball team. Arsenal, a Premier League team, saw its kit and merchandise revenue grow by 26%, to £130m, during the 2024-25 season.
当然，周边商品并不是什么新鲜事物。一直以来，周边商品在三大领域都十分常见。首先是儿童用品，为艾莎公主裙或巴斯光年玩具掏过腰包的家长，都见识过周边的威力。其次是音乐。巴克莱银行(Barclays)预测，今年夏天，哈利·史泰尔斯（Harry Styles）的粉丝在其巡演伦敦站期间，人均将豪掷100英镑（约合135美元）购买周边商品。周边商品也是球队的一大创收利器。如今，纽约街头依然随处可见路人身着蓝橙配色服饰，这正是最近夺冠的纽约尼克斯队的代表色。2024—2025赛季，英超球队阿森纳的球衣及周边商品收入同比增长26%，达到1.3亿英镑。
Today, however, a much wider range of businesses are using merch as marketing. It helps that making such products is cheap and easy. A tote bag might cost less than $1 to produce in bulk but may be seen by thousands of people during its life cycle. For Daunt Books or Shakespeare and Company, whose totes are loved by the literati, that translates to billions of eyeballs.
然而，现在越来越多不同行业的企业正在把周边作为一种营销工具。有利的一点是，周边产品制作简单、成本低廉。一个托特袋批量制作成本不足1美元，但在整个使用周期内，却可能被成千上万的人看到。对于敦特书店（Daunt Books）和莎士比亚书店（Shakespeare and Company）而言，他们的托特袋深受文学届人士追捧，这意味着将收获数十亿次目光。
Merch also enables companies to present a fun image. Many lean into humour to convey a sense of personality. In June Lidl, a supermarket, released “The Three Lidls Jersey” to coincide with the World Cup. The parody England football strip was made from a liquid- and odour-resistant fabric: all the better to withstand showers of beer from fellow exuberant fans. It sold out in 55 seconds.
周边商品还能帮助企业塑造妙趣横生的品牌形象。不少企业大打幽默牌，以此彰显品牌个性。今年6月，超市历徳（Lidl）配合世界杯推出了一款“三历徳球衣”（The Three Lidls Jersey）。这款恶搞版英格兰队球衣采用防液体渗透、防异味面料，更能扛住身边狂热球迷庆祝时四处泼洒的啤酒。一经发售，55秒就卖光了。
注：“The Three Lidls Jersey”名字戏仿了英格兰足球队“三狮军团”（Three Lions）的称号。
For consumers, branded gear can be a way of showing support for a beloved local business, a trend spurred by the pandemic. Jared Watson of New York University says the merch trend also marks a change in how young people are “signalling” through their clothes and accessories. Growing up in the digital age has changed their consumer psychology, he says. Clothing brands can seem generic. Now the urge is to show their individuality through experiences they have had or places they have visited that make them feel special. “Status has changed shape,” agrees Connor Archbold of Tracksuit, a brand consultancy: “You used to signal it with a price tag, a designer label or an expensive watch. Now it runs more on taste and belonging.”
就消费者而言，购买品牌周边服装是支持他们钟爱的本地商品的一种方式，这种趋势因疫情而加速。纽约大学的贾里德·沃森称，这种商品趋势也表明年轻人通过服饰“发出信号”的方式已发生变化。他说，在数字时代长大，改变了他们的消费心理。追求服装品牌似乎已无新意。现如今，年轻人的冲动是通过自己的经历或到过的地方来彰显个性，那些会让他们觉得自己独一无二的东西。“地位换了一种表现形态，”品牌追踪（Tracksuit，品牌咨询公司）的康纳·阿齐博尔德（Connor Archbold）同意说，“过去，你通过价签、设计师标签或者名表来显示身份。现在，更多围绕品味和归属感。”
Counter-intuitively, merch worn to stand out is also a means of tying in with a community. Almost half of citizens across the West are not a member of anything, be it a faith group, sports club or other civic organisation. In this socially atomised context, wearing a piece of merch, particularly for something obscure, is the equivalent of being “small fish in a big pond that can find other small fish”, says Mr Watson. For some, the ultimate aim is simply a knowing nod of approval from a stranger.
反直觉的是，穿周边来彰显个性也是融入社团的一种方式。在西方各国，几乎半数公民不属于任何社团，无论宗教团体、体育俱乐部，还是其他公民组织。按沃森的说法，在这个社会原子化的背景下，穿周边服装——尤其是某个冷门圈子的周边——相当于“大池塘里的小鱼，借此可以彼此遇见其他的小鱼”。对一些人而言，终极目标只不过是来自陌生人会意的点头赞许。
The next trend is more personal merch. Firms like Etsy have enabled consumers to produce bespoke items such as cups, matches and t-shirts as favours for their birthday parties, hen dos and weddings. This year Architectural Digest wrote about people giving swag to houseguests, asking: “Should your home have its own merch?” The more people prize experiences, the more valuable souvenirs become. Everyone has cottoned on.
下一个潮流将是更个人化的周边。像埃齐（Etsy）这样的公司，让消费者能够定制杯子、火柴、T恤等物品，用作生日宴会、新娘派对、结婚典礼上的伴手礼。今年《建筑文摘》（Architectural Digest）写了一篇关于人们向留宿客人赠送自家周边的文章，并在文中问道：“你家是不是也该有自己的周边？”人们越看重体验，纪念品就越来越有价值。每个人都意识到这一点。
翻译组：
Jack Jan，实践出真知
zy，当下快乐就是意义
Alex，不务正业的理工男
审校组：
Rachel，心有懵虎，细嗅乌龟
Yu Yang，架一艘译舰巡航无数内心的曲折宇宙
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