Luxury as Information

The decision to purchase or not to purchase a luxury item constitutes a bit of information about the affluent consumer making the decision.

Which item is purchased (Armani or Ralph Lauren) and where it is purchased (Neiman Marcus or Barney's) constitute additional bits of information.

How frequently such purchases are made, the channels they are made in and the conditions (e.g., sale, early in the season, with the assistance of a personal shopper, etc.) under which they are made constitute additional bit of information.

Add up the bits and you have quite a bit of information about the consumer.

The next question becomes, are these various acts random or is there a pattern? If there is a pattern, what does the pattern mean. What exactly is the information that emerges from these shopping pixels? Is it possible to impute intention or motivation from behavior?

At one level the answer to all these questions is yes. However, it is very interesting to look at this question through the lens of information theory. In determining "meaning," Information theory considers the expectations of the recipient as well as the messages generated by the sender. The pixels will look different if your set is black-and-white than if it is color.

That is, the bits of data become information only in the context of the receiver. The purchase of a Maserati by person A probably means something different to person B (say,  a teenage boy)  and person C (say, a middle aged man). And Person A may attach a third and different meaning to his purchase.

It is this phenomenon, the subjectivity of the receiver or observer, that makes marketing luxury such a delicate business, Luxury, by definition, arouses feelings. These feelings can taint the objectivity of the marketer as well as stimulate the behavior of the customer.

From what perspective does the marketer look at the purchase and ownership of luxury?  From the perspective of a person who can routinely afford the very best? Or from the perspective of his/her own life situation? This is marketing's version of the Uncertainty Principle: An object changes when measured.

Luxury is useful information only if there is an objective frame of reference. This objectivity is one of the attributes of LifeStyle.