Allocated

"I'm sorry, sir. Those are allocated."

It was the last thing I expected to hear at a grocery store inside of the King's Road railway station in West London. Surprised, because my 10 year old son had first told me about Prime sports drink on the flight over the Atlantic. I couldn't fathom it. How in the world could some YouTube fueled Gatorade competitor create so much demand that a 500 ml bottle was going for as much as ￡15?

It's not like it's whiskey.

Or Nikes.

Wait a second. Is this the future of consumerism? Artificial supply restrictions and consumer-fueled fervor? Well, it depends.

Mania around consumer items is not new. My mom chased a semi-truck around Indianapolis in the mid 1980s because she thought there were Cabbage Kids on board. There were. She got two. The Tickle Me Elmo era was a thing. How was that a thing? And every Black Friday people flood stores to fistfight over off-brand microwaves and deeply discounted neti pots.

Sports trading cards are hot again, as grown men tear threw boxes of card stock to find glossy dodo birds.

At the risk of sounding like the buzz kill of 2023, I think all of this is consumerism at its worst. And yes, I hunt for allocated whiskey on occasion. Just like our politics, organized religion, media, and morality, consumerism will continue to progress until it's nearly unrecognizable. Collective society will take consumerism to an unbearable place. I have zero doubts about that.

You don't have to go to that place. But you do have to choose to not go to that place. Just like with religion, politics, and morality, you have to choose your relationship with those constructs.

If you don't choose, you won't like the results. No matter how you cut it, a sports drink is not worth ￡15 pounds. A pair of Nikes isn't worth $10,000. And a bottle of brown spirits isn't worth the opportunity cost.

I