Brand as religion - the unbelievable scientific truth

Here’s an image - people waiting in line to enter church after a high holiday. This holy day falls on the Tuesday following the first harvest full moon. A dull murmur hangs over the line that snakes back and forth through the mass. Specially dressed decants monitor the length of the line, slowly admitting worshipers into the holy establishment. The air is thick with anticipation. Each believer takes communion and leaves with a token of his or her faith.

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A 2010 Pew study indicates that the millennial generation remains across the board less religiously affiliated. The up-and-coming millennial generation (born 1980-2000) reports they are less likely than older generations to affiliate with religion, attend religious services and pray on a daily basis. Although religion seemingly plays a less important role in the average 20-somethings’ life, some things haven’t changed.

It is important not to confuse an institution with a human behavior.

Quick psychology lesson. We all know the human brain is made up of multiple functional areas. Some areas are older than others. Some do different things. In an effort to over-simplify everything – our brain has a logical, emotional and instinctual side. Even though religion may be absent for the average millennial, the human instinct and need remains constant. Do not confuse a lack of affiliation with the lack of the primal need that religion fills.

The religious image above is from September 2014. On a day just after September 9th, I was standing just outside the infamous 5th Avenue Apple store in NYC. I looked out across the street at the throng of people waiting in line - You’ve undoubtedly heard of this metaphor of Apple fans and religion. 

But did you know that a recent study showed that non-religious Americans rely on brands to a larger degree than religious people? Did you know that recent MRIs of Apple fan-boy brains revealed the same illuminated areas as the religiously devoted?

Imagine if churches began running marketing research and fancy advertisements.

Brand as religion is less of a metaphor and more of a scientific fact. It is therefore logical to conclude that more and more the millennial shopper is looking to fill the meaning, the grander purpose, the need to belong and the creation of identity that comes with religion by substituting brands. 

Brands offer all of this to shoppers with additional benefits and half the guilt (depending on whether a corporate scandal breaks out). By fine-tuning brands to mimic certain elements of religious institutions, we can align to the consumer’s real need.  The first modern-day element – sincerity. Nothing are shoppers more quick to root out than the foul smell of deceit or duplicity…

Invisible

invisibly it bends around us,
curling, snaking and coniving
like a virus spread between us
always growing, mophing, changing
slowly it unfurls a path before us
an eternal chanting chorus

easily it consumes gigantic objects,
Jaggurants, titanics and the sun
outpacing the fastest and the furthest
it arrives before we’ve begun
nimbly tackling the complex and small
there is no space in which it cannot crawl

Yet it does not exist beyond its use
its advance is dictated by the tongue
for all its vigor, it must be set loose
it does not exist unless the song is song