Trends: Is the Death of Themed Products Coming?

I wrote a couple of weeks ago in “How the Economy Affects Scrapbooking Style” about several trends that I believe are coming as a result of the recent economic downturn. Now I’ve decided to add another prediction to that list: the death (or at least serious decline) of themed products.

Yes, I know consumers have historically loved themed scrapbooking products. I know the typical scrapbooker till now has started a themed scrapbook page (such as a holiday event or a sports page) by searching their stash for appropriately themed items.

But the economy is going to bring a shift to the priorities of both buyers and sellers, a shift that will make non-themed product more appealing economically to both sides of the sale.

In lean times, manufacturers and retailers need to serve all of their customers’ needs somehow while carrying less inventory and offering less product. They need flexibility and versatility, to do more with less for their customers.

Consumers face a similar quandry. They need the limited amount of supplies they can purchase to be more flexible. They need to be able to use the scraps of paper or left over embellishments from one page on another project. Having left over soccer rub-ons doesn’t help them if their next project is a back-to-school page.

The answer for consumers is the same as for the manufacturers and retailers: buy more generic styles of designs and accent them with small amounts of themed items or use them to create themed items like a paper piecing. Basically, it’s the “little black dress” theory of scrapbooking – use simple basics and then dress them up with a few carefully chosen accessories. In a tough economy, it’s more economically manageable for both buyer and seller.

Themed probably won’t die out completely. But I think that it will start to be restricted to less expensive items and to smaller package sizes. Items that are inexpensive enough that it isn’t a disaster if a little bit is left over, or that are pretty much guaranteed to be entirely used on a single page, will still be around. (Good examples would be paper designs or the small packages of Jolee’s Boutique currently offered by EK Success – just enough to accent a single page layout.) Consumers won’t want to invest a lot in themed items that they may not use all of. Instead of buying themed kits, consumers will prefer more “ala carte” type shopping for those items to ensure there is no waste.

So, who’s going to be the designer of scrapbooking’s killer “little black dress”?