Obsolescence

This article will focus on two types of obsolescence: planned and perceived obsolescence. 
 

Planned obsolescence is a business strategy where products are purposely designed to have a shorter lifespan and to become broken, unusable or outdated faster. Planned obsolescence is essentially a purposeful reduction in product quality to promote more consumption (by buying replacement items). There are numerous ways companies can implement planned obsolescence, including using low quality materials, making software malfunction or slow down, and creating short-lived trends (designed to go out of style quickly).

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Perceived obsolescence occurs when consumers believe an item has become outdated or undesirable, even when it still works. Perceived obsolescence is based on manipulating what consumers believe about their possessions.

 

​Common product categories that use perceived obsolescence in their marketing include mobile phones & electronics, fashion, cars and household appliances.

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Why is this bad?

​Both forms of obsolescence are simply strategies to encourage people to purchase more - more items, more frequently, to earn companies more PROFIT. The only ones benefitting from this are those in corporations. In the end, buying lots of cheap, disposable products designed to last only a few uses will end up costing more than investing in more expensive and good quality items designed to last. Buying cheaply made and cheaply priced appliances that break, and the parts required to repair are almost the price of a new appliance, ends up costing more than investing higher quality in the first place.

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Of course, the environmental harm is massive from products breaking and being discarded before their lifetime should have been over. Both forms of obsolescence create unnecessary additional waste; and more burden on the planet for resources to create new products to replace items thrown away before their time.

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What You Can Do

Perceived and planned obsolescence are things you can fight. We all send a message to corporations with where we spend our money. Choosing wisely and investing in high quality products--ones we NEED, designed to last a long time--and actively avoiding giving our money to low quality, planned-obsolescence exploiting companies, teaches corporations what consumers care about.

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​YOU have the power to perceive the products you use as perfectly good, even if they're older than a few weeks. YOU can invest in higher quality companies who aren't manipulating their customers with products designed to break as fast as tolerated. If lots of people start showing their values by boycotting companies using this tactic and buying higher-quality, the market will get the message.