I’ve noticed that the “wise consumer” is most likely to spend money on things that they have calculated are worth both the tangible money cost, and the intangible costs and benefits. Worth, to the wise consumer, is not purely derived from monetary value. It also takes into account joy from the purchase, longevity, and how often it is used. This isn’t too different from the definitions of sustainability that we have been looking at!
In terms of specific product/service categories, I would say that areas where items are very useful but in rare situations and don’t really bring joy are more neglected as a final purchase for wise consumers. So, as useful as saws can be, if you only chop wood once in five years a wise consumer wouldn’t buy that saw—I think lots of tools can fit into this category but that this varies person to person. I think that a wise consumer would naturally be attracted to things like coffee makers and quality rain jackets; coffee brings people together in the mornings, is necessary for some to get up for work on early days, and the good coffee makers are used almost every day for a long time. Good rain jackets last a long time, can be *combined (another point I’ll get to later) with a variety of outfits for a variety of climates or styles, and help avoid a discomfort—being cold and wet. Service-wise, I think the wise consumer would invest in services like Netflix if they watch tv with their family every day, but would not invest in a monthly bowling subscription if they only went once a year for their son’s birthday.
*On my point on combination: things seem to be more appealing to wise consumers if they have multiple uses or values. This gets into my next point of:
Design Principles:
I think a key objective would be to design something that is both multi-use or worth. An example of this could be a handheld coffee grinder. Yes, it has one purpose, but you might appreciate it in your kitchen or camping, and for different worths: one is simply using less electricity, one is helping you to enjoy without having electricity. Another example could be multi-use kitchen utensils you normally need daily, from a company you know and trust.
As far as a service goes, it has to work in that it is solving a relevant problem for the wise consumer that they were previously spending more resources than the problem was worth. For example, bike sharing services are less expensive than buying a bike and lugging it around everywhere. Plus, sustainability-wise, it’s better to be sharing with other people so that consumers aren’t buying too many bikes that in the future would be put to waste.