“Drop culture” to the point of overdose

Under 30 years old, Hopare is one of the most popular French contemporary artists. It is almost impossible to find one of his works on the market. His work is rare, therefore expensive, as the old saying goes, and sought after by collectors. It is also very elaborate. This summer, afficionados were delighted when they saw this post on his Instagram account: "Heritage is a limited edition, with availability beginning Sunday, June 5 at 8:00 am and closing the following Sunday, June 12, 2022 at midnight. Numbered and signed 7-day edition". One week later, nearly 400 people had reserved and paid the artist in advance. Turnover: over 150,000 euros in a few days.

This is what is called a "drop": a flood of objects, that companies use to create an event around their products launches to make them more desirable by limiting their quantity and availability. The phenomenon has been a hit with millennials for years, and consumer brands are using it at large thanks to mobile technology, which makes it easy to buy and accessible to the greatest number of people worldwide.

Nike, especially Jordan, multiply small series impossible to find, and have organized the scarcity of their production in a scientific way, to constantly create frustration: mandatory registration upon application, SNKRS, daily emails on arrivals, mandatory appointments on Saturday mornings at 9:00 am, and an online lottery reserved for the luckiest. Despite this sadistic sales system, the numbers have never been so good.

But for a long time, the phenomenon, invented by trendy stores in Japan in the 1980s, only affected limited series of sneakers or t-shirts of streetwear brands. Supreme generalized it in the 90's and consecrated the drop to the rank of art. The Internet did the rest. Before, waiting in line for hours to buy a limited edition t-shirt or a pair of sneakers was the norm. Over recent years, the web and social networks have popularized the principle. "Technology has enabled this phenomenon to spread throughout most of the U.S. consumer economy," writes the Wall Street Journal, including the most popular strata, such as McDonalds.