The strategies of major luxury players are mostly based on one word: desirability. For them, this notion determines in large part the performance assessment of executives, who must develop the desirability of their brands. It also determines the everyday work of the business teams whose job it is to give it substance via creations, products, experiences, communications. However, this central notion of desirability is rarely questioned or redefined.

In terms of using words as totems, the meanings of which we no longer question sufficiently, the philosopher Etienne Balibar talks about ‘practical signifiers’ to say that only the shell of the word remains (the meaning is no longer raised) and that it is very convenient to use them because we no longer have to think about the content. However, there is a risk that terms of this kind become devoid of substance, and in particular that their meanings and operational applications are not sufficiently reinvested to bring them into line with new contemporary challenges.

And yet, the notion of ‘desirability’ raises numerous questions.

Is desirability, something we always define in the singular, a unique, universal concept? Are there not instead multiple desirabilities? This question leads immediately to two others:

• Does desirability mean the same thing for North American clients as it does for Chinese clients? Why is luxury so undesirable today for the Indian market? What would it mean if it were desirable? Regardless, how can we further explore the cultural plurality of desirability?
• This concept of ‘desirability’ is above all applied to the fashion and leather goods sector, but does it not also apply to others? It most certainly does, but how? Desirability does not mean the same thing for wines and spirits, for example, nor does it generate the same type of responsibility: making alcohol desirable is not the same thing as making a dress desirable.

Another area of questioning is also worth investigating: today, new realms – and the new ways of life that go with them – are becoming desirable. And yet, they are sometimes in stark contrast to what the model of luxury might traditionally convey. For example, sobriety and frugality are becoming desirable. Elsewhere, the demand for and pride in diverse identities is growing. In this context, will the desirability of the French art de vivre, which at least in part inspires the desirability strategies of major luxury players, last? Might it suddenly be interpreted as arrogant, ‘colonial’, disdainful of other cultures?

An x-ray of these new desirables could prove to be a critical task. It would of course help us to better integrate them to meet new expectations, but it would also allow us to choose to distribute those that are deemed to be the most likely to have a positive impact, particularly in environmental and social terms. What futures are desirable? What others are not? In other words, what type of desirability will luxury players seek to promote? This is also a question that the notion of desirability forces us to address.

The philosopher Spinoza thought that it is not because an object is desirable that we desire it. On the contrary, it is because we desire it that is becomes desirable. Desirability is thus first and foremost a question of direction and use of our desires, be they individual or collective.

Sophie Chassat – Senior VP Sustainability, Accuracy
Accuracy Talks Straight #8 – The Cultural Corner