A transition has begun in many parts of the world from mass production and consumption to responsible ownership. Interest in sustainability is raising awareness of the life story of individual products from sourcing to disposal. In this story, ours is just one of the hundreds of chapters throughout the life of the things we own.

(This is one of a series of Why Pixies, Why Now posts)

Mass production and distribution have enabled generations of consumers to experience an ever wider choice of higher quality less expensive products. Economies of scale across globally extended and integrated supply chains have dramatically lowered individual unit production and transportation costs.

In this environment, little attention is given to individual product units – we focus on categories and models because each individual unit within these sets is the same. It’s hard to feel attached to something that lacks identity and so we don’t care as much about throwing it away; particularly if you can replace it with a new model which does a better job and costs less.

Products in this category are ‘fungible’ – they can be substituted with a similar product without impacting the utility for the owner. I don’t care if you replace my can of beans with another of the same type and brand.

Recently, people have become increasingly concerned about the social and environmental impact of their mass consumption. More people care about their role as responsible consumers in areas such as ethical & geographical sourcing and production, the provenance of their food, brand (and in theory quality) authenticity, product safety, support for circular supply chains, and a product’s net cost to the environment – not just the cost of buying it.

The good news is that because mass production and distribution utilise digital channels, and the cost of data processing is close to zero, individual product item data is now being generated as a by-product of integrated supply and service chains without compromising economies of scale. The more people care about their responsibility, the more this data will be sought as an assurance of the history and qualities of the goods and services they consume. Brands that serve this need will benefit through greater loyalty and trust.

Of course, there are some kinds of products that people have always cared about. Art, antiques, collectables and bespoke hand-crafted items are examples of things with unique qualities that make them ‘non-fungible’ – i.e. difficult or impossible to substitute or exchange with something equivalent or identical.

Today, like mass-produced products, even these unique items have acquired a digital footprint as a byproduct of the digital communication and documentation generated by the people who care about them.

Uniqueness arises through a combination of identifying features, characteristics and history. As it becomes easier to establish context through a blend of physical and digital evidence, it will be more common to think about all the ‘things’ we care about as having unique ‘non-fungible’ identities. The more we see something as unique, the more likely we are to look after it.

To blend physical and digital evidence, there needs to be a common point of reference. Being self-centred consumers, we like to think that the common reference is us. But in fact, the life of a product extends over hundreds of stakeholders and our relationship with that product is just one of many in a product’s lifetime. To see the whole story, we need a through-life view with the product – not the consumer – at the centre.

The data for mass-produced items are scattered across supply, distribution, retail and service chains. Non-mass-produced item data is scattered across retail records, current and past owners, historical studies and informal interest groups. The common thread in both cases is the custody-oriented view of the data – who owns & services the item rather than the unique journey of the item through the hands of many interested stakeholders across many events.

As we gain a better appreciation of our role as responsible consumers, service providers, distributors and manufacturers, we’ll see the emergence of a new, product-centric perspective. That is, from the product’s point of view – events and contexts through its life, recorded in a verifiable, authoritative digital trail of history and stakeholder interactions.