Saturation Point

When do we collectively as a consumer base decide when enough is enough? I had an interesting discussion today with a store owner about how paper lines and embellishments are looking more and more like eachother and that there is simply nothing new anymore. I pondered this quite a bit. The fact is, many of my store owners and students feel this growing ambivalence in general and the things that generate true "excitement" are few and far between. I was reminded about the day my son came in saying he was bored. He mentioned that he had already played with all his toys and couldn't find a thing to do. I told him he could always clean his room and that it would definitely take some time and effort....he declined. In that moment I pulled one of those "Mom" quotes from my head (the ones you promised yourself you would never say when you had children but that you find yourself saying all the time just like your Mom used to...scary I know, you really are turning into her...wink) I told him, go make your own fun, it wasn't my job to entertain....

The industry is at a weird crossroads I think. For so long, the hunger for new stuff and the necessity to crank out new stuff to meet that demand has manufacturers creating things around the clock in order to satisfy what is in essence an industry-wide boredom and desire to be entertained. These things actually saturate the market and dilute their product and cannibalize their sales. One line is barely out and making any profit before it is replaced by something new- something that really doesn't look too much different but enough for folks to think it is. What if, for a moment we as an industry said enough, go and work with what you have for a bit. Let the consumer marinate a bit on the things they have at their fingertips and feed them new ideas and seeds of inspiration to do with the stuff they have? I don't know. Until there is new innovation in our industry, the law of diminishing returns has taken a hold and that saturation point is close at hand. A bored crafter does not buy new stuff, they move onto something else that tickles their muse and challenges them.