文 | 深观商业
10月末，“老干妈AI裁员传闻引争议”话题登上社交平台热搜。原因是有多家媒体发文称“老干妈一年营收高达54亿元，却用AI把600名工人精简到48人”。在这个“恐惧AI取代人类”的高敏感时代，这一消息瞬间激起千层浪。
尽管老干妈官方再三澄清回应称传闻不实，但网友的态度依旧很坚决。目前，网上类似“你让工人下岗，我们就让你下架。”的论调始终包围着这家曾经国民好感度超强的经典品牌，且进一步影响到了消费端。
据悉，老干妈近日的线上销售额出现了明显下跌。公开报道显示，以某电商平台为例，10月22日起老干妈连续多日销售额为1000—5000元，而在传闻开始前，其日销售额多稳定在5000—1万元。
当然，随着AI时代的到来，老干妈AI风波绝非孤例。当各行各业都开始用AI降本增效，越来越多的消费品牌习惯“重效率、轻共情”，一旦消费者的情感接受度受到挑战，往后类似的抵制声浪可能会成为消费行业的常态戏码。
总之，一次舆论翻车，照见了整个消费赛道在AI时代的转型尴尬。
被企业集体忽略的“商誉”成本账
一瓶辣酱的AI升级，怎么就能演变成一场品牌销量缩水危机？
事实上，步入AI时代，企业用AI来节约成本，计算省了多少人工、提了多少效率、降了多少不良率，这本身无可厚非。但这套发端于工业制造的成本测算逻辑，套用在直面C端的消费品牌身上真的合适吗？
对纯生产属性的工厂而言，减人提效是时代带来的科技红利，但对消费品牌而言，厂房、产线与渠道之外，消费者好感、信任、情感溢价……这些都要算在盈利因素里。
毕竟品牌声誉滑坡，造成的损失往往比想象中更大。
老干妈抵制声浪初起时，市场上不乏一些“侥幸”观点，认为网络抵制的冲击力仅局限于线上。而老干妈作为深耕线下数十年的传统消费品牌，线上渠道在其整体营收中占比不高，这场舆论风波至多造成线上销量的短期波动，很难伤及其基本盘。
公开数据也印证了这一点，有媒体报道老干妈早在前几年就几乎“断网”。
公众号 2022年3月停更，抖音鲜有直播。由于电商销售占比不足5%，线上营销成本却占到总预算30%，企业解散直播团队，重心回归线下渠道。依靠全国商超、夫妻老婆店的渠道优势，2025年三季度，老干妈三款核心产品合计市场份额超16%。
马上赢的数据显示，2022至2025年老干妈在国内辣椒酱细分赛道份额稳定在55%左右，位居行业首位；在更广的中式调味酱赛道，其品牌合计市场份额约16%，同样排名第一，旗下风味豆豉油辣椒等三款核心单品占据中式调味酱单品榜单前三名。
但线上的舆论真的对一个线下消费品牌影响不大吗？如果继续用“渠道为王”的旧逻辑来估量社交时代的品牌风险，这其实多少有失偏颇，毕竟线上除了是一个独立的销售渠道外，更多时候是整个消费决策过程的认知前提。
典型的前车之鉴是农夫山泉与海天酱油，往往国民度越高的品牌，其舆论反应力度越大。
作为两大线下消费品牌，农夫山泉曾经在年报里直言：由于品牌形象遭受了历史性的考验，包装饮用水产品的市占率经历了3个月的持续下滑。2024年度，集团录得包装饮用水产品收入159.52亿元，比上年少卖了约43亿元，同比下降21.3%，占总收入比重也由上一年的49.7%下滑至37.2%。
这直接导致了当年农夫山泉包装饮用水业务首次退居为公司第二大收入来源。更值得注意的是，国民品牌的商誉折损有一定的延续性，时至今日，网络上的抵制声浪已经退潮，但一部分高情感粘性用户却永久性流失。
无独有偶，海天也曾因为添加剂“双标”发生过舆论危机，尽管企业官方多次声明，但品牌商誉受损传导至资本端、销售端的后果依旧很“沉重”。据悉，海天味业一度在一日内蒸发约360亿元市值。
销售端同步受挫，Sandalwood电商监测数据显示，当年10月酱油品类整体同比增长54%，而海天酱油产品在主要电商平台销售额同比下降32%。海天味业在当月甚至失去了酱油产品线上市占率第一的位置。
回到老干妈本身，它的舆论抗风险能力，或许比农夫山泉、海天味业更加脆弱。
后者至少拥有成熟的公关与线上运营体系，能够通过官方声明、联动营销、用户沟通来逐步修复消费者认知。但老干妈这几年的网络“缺席”意味着品牌在社交舆论场失去了一定的修复能力。
10月27日，《BUG》栏目报道，部分地区超市与便利店出现了将老干妈撤下货架的现象。
其次，与农夫山泉、海天不同的是，老干妈的品牌故事一直与“白手起家”“小人物逆袭”这些底层叙事挂钩，天然博得了一些消费者的共情。而今一场AI闹剧颠覆了品牌过往设定，也是无数网友无法接受的关键原因。
然而，AI向消费产业的渗透已不可逆转，往后还会有更多品牌奔赴所谓的效率牌局，更极致的降本方案、更亮眼的提效数字不断出现。但愿老干妈，能让全行业算清另一笔账：技术进步的价值，不该以消解品牌的情感根基为代价。
AI正在“消解”传统消费品牌最起码的人情味？
放眼全球消费制造产业链，AI 渗透程度最深的有两大领域：后端制造端、前端营销端。
尤其是营销端，2026年以来，消费赛道已经发生多起“AI营销翻车”事件，包括苏泊尔、baby sheep在内，统计显示，仅今年上半年，就有超过十个品牌因AI广告内容引发舆情。其中，苏泊尔的AI广告疑似还冲击到了股价。
Jasper AI相关报告显示，全球91%的营销团队已常态化使用AI工具开展工作。
值得一提的是，全球头部消费品牌已经在紧锣密鼓地搭建AI模型。例如，百事搭了PepGenX平台，雀巢推出了内部专用的NesGPT，宝洁构建了“AI工厂”，可口可乐设立了首席数字官，联合利华把数据平台迁上谷歌云……
这也在情理之中，毕竟“营销”对消费品牌的重要性不可磨灭，甚至一次优秀的营销是品牌销售增长的直接动力，这也导致营销成本往往在一个快消品牌支出中占大头。
数据显示，一个典型的快消集团，每年要将营收的10%到20%投入到广告、促销和消费者沟通上，这笔钱动辄数十亿、上百亿美元。但如果连接AI，这一笔支出应该会有明显的下降，且效率比之人工时代会显著提升。
就目前来看，雀巢、宝洁、联合利华等多家头部消费品牌都公开了自己转型AI后的成果。
以雀巢为例，雀巢开发的AI虚拟销售助手，能在试点市场为销售人员节省20%到35%的时间；宝洁与Impact Analytics合作的货架智能管理工具RackSmart在巴西市场试用后缺货率降低了15%。
联合利华与IPG Studios合作开发的Sketch Pro整合了Adobe Firefly和Google Veo 3等多个AI平台，能在两小时内将概念转化为可供消费者测试的素材。同时，各大电商平台上的AI客服遍地开花。
效率报表上的数字固然在节节走高，降本的逻辑固然自洽而诱人。但抛开这一点，本该与“人本主义”结合最紧密的消费赛道集体转向AI，品牌最起码的人情味还能继续保留吗？
首先，消费者已经意识到流水线式的AI广告、机械刻板的AI客服，缺乏品牌沟通里基本的活人感。Gartner 2026年3 月发布的消费者调查显示，50%的美国消费者表示更愿意选择不使用生成式AI的品牌。
落到售后场景，消费者对遍地铺开的AI客服同样抱有负面情绪。2026年上半年，中消协发布《2026年上半年全国消协组织受理投诉情况分析》，其中AI客服问题首次被点名，成为了投诉的新热点。
当然，比起消费者的不满与不便，最令人担忧的是AI效率提升，会不会带来岗位替代。
事实上，在老干妈点燃舆论风暴之前，“AI 替代人力”就已经是戳中全球消费者神经的敏感问题，只是没有任何一家品牌愿意正面承认。但翻遍各大消费巨头的裁员公告与组织调整记录就会发现，这场全球范围内的“饭碗”不安，变成了无可回避的现实。
以雀巢为例，据悉，雀巢计划在未来两年内在全球范围内裁员约16000人。其中，约12000名为白领专业人士，到2027年底将推动每年节省10亿瑞士法郎（比原计划的5亿瑞士法郎翻倍）；相关的一次性重组成本预计为年度节省额的两倍。
品牌集体缄默的背后，还有许多企业计划值得深思。
例如，2025年，宝洁宣布未来两年将裁减最多7000个非制造就业岗位，大约占这类岗位总数的15%；联合利华也提出未来三年裁员7500人（占员工总数5.9%），以节省8亿欧元成本。
种种迹象显示，老干妈风波似乎只是AI时代的序章。
它不是第一个因AI触发抵制的品牌，更不会是最后一个。即便抵制、声讨，赋予了消费者一定的消费权利与立场。可当整个行业都驶入同一条AI的快车道，情绪宣泄，究竟能改变什么？
是能叫停AI流水线的落地，还是能拦住巨头们的裁员计划？
这个问题，显然无法回答。
“人工”会再度成为消费赛道的溢价方式吗？
回望上一轮工业革命的时代变迁，机器取代手工、流水线上出来的工业品以极致的性价比覆盖了大众消费市场。也让“手工”生产从落后、低效变成高端、昂贵、稀缺的代名词，支撑了一众奢侈品牌溢价，成为至今都不过时的商业逻辑。
例如，始终强调“手工打磨”“匠人工艺”“雕刻时光”的百达翡丽、江诗丹顿；坚持“一匠人一包”原则的爱马仕；MIU MIU高达5950元的“钩针编织袋”被质疑太贵时，官方回应的理由也是工艺成本。
甚至在大众消费领域，这条规律同样成立。
这边机器量产的面包铺满超市货架，那边“手工现烤”烘焙店定价能高出30%-50%。
如今，AI浪潮席卷而来，能否让“人工”再度成为消费赛道的溢价方式？
不可否认，当前无论是内容赛道、还是制造端，“手搓党”已经成为这个时代里最能锚定品牌身份、区隔价值赛道的三个字。
短视频平台“手搓万物”话题播放量突破50亿次；茶饮品牌喜欢宣传“现熬手作、古法工艺”，在卷到极致的赛道跑出高端路线；非遗食品、手作文创品牌喜欢在详情页标注“全程手工、无AI参与”；纯手作短剧《ENEMY》全平台播放量超10亿次，“无AI”成为其最醒目的传播标签。
似乎AI越普及，手工就越稀缺，标准化越廉价，人工温度就越值钱。
2026年开年，就有媒体提出：2026年什么最值钱？答案赫然是活人感。
据悉，海外已经出现一些零售品牌“返璞归真”，抛弃效率，崇尚人本。典型的例子是在社交网络上掀起热潮的美国连锁超市Trader Joe's，主动拒绝主流商业模式，只保留约 4000个SKU，坚持人工收银而非自动结账机。
欧莱雅、联合利华一边用AI提效，一边开始克制使用AI生成广告。全球手工艺品电商平台Etsy 2026年Q1财报显示，“handmade”相关搜索量同比增长27%，创五年新高。手工皮具、手工陶艺、手工装帧书籍等品类增速显著跑赢平台大盘。
而消费者也的确愿意为“手工”支付更高的溢价。市场研究机构尼尔森2026年的一项调查显示，全球68%的消费者表示愿意为明确标注“人工制作”“无AI参与”的创意产品支付10%至30%的溢价。
这间接带动了早在互联网时代就被抛弃的传统文具。
比利时D'Ieteren旗下的笔记本品牌Moleskine，在连年下滑之后，上半年有机销售增长超过6%；拥有Sharpie记号笔、Paper Mate等笔具品牌的Newell Brands，2026年以来股价上涨约六成；英国卖书、手工艺品的实体连锁The Works，今年股价上涨近两倍。
据悉，《金融时报》还为全球坚持手搓的群体取了个名字：“反AI消费组合”。
只不过，这一轮手工消费与上一轮手工消费的发展路径相同吗？
上一轮手工溢价是因为很多精密调校、复杂工艺、非标准化细节只能依赖人手，市场最终形成了两种模式：大众消费由机器走量，高端溢价由手工承接。客群不同，价值不同，手工品牌受限于产能规模，很难对大众市场形成冲击。
而这一轮手搓潮的稀缺性，很大程度上来自消费端的主动选择。
只是，在效率至上的洪流里，消费者还能有多少选择，这是个悲壮的问题。AI时代一场场带着惶惑的集体反向突围，或许到头来的结局大概率只剩值得称赞、缅怀、铭记的情怀，而不会迎来真真正正的胜利。
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Documentation
At the end of October, the topic of "Ai layoffs is controversial" appeared on social platforms. The reason for this is the fact that, according to a number of media articles, “Godmothers collects up to $5.4 billion a year, while 600 workers are reduced to 48 with AI”. In this highly sensitive era of “the fear of AI to replace human beings”, this news has suddenly triggered thousands of waves.
The attitude of the netizens remains firm, despite repeated clarifications from the official authorities that the response is false. At the moment, online is like, "You get workers laid off, we get you off the shelf." The argument is always surrounded by a classic brand that used to be extremely popular with citizens, and it further affects consumers.
It has been reported that there has been a marked decline in online sales by godmothers in recent days. Public reports indicate that, for example, in the case of an electrician platform, godmothers sold over a period of $1,000-$5,000 a day from 22 October, while their daily sales remained stable at $50-10,000 prior to the start of the rumours.
Of course, with the arrival of the AI era, the Ai Fong is by no means alone. As industries begin to use AI to reduce their efficiency gains, consumer brands are increasingly used to be “high-efficiency, low-intensity” and a similar wave of resistance may become a normal feature of the consumer industry once the emotional acceptance of consumers is challenged.
All in all, a turn-over of public opinion was a reflection of the entire consumer track ' s transformation in the AI era.
"Create" cost accounts ignored by corporate groups
How can an AI upgrade of a bottle of spicy sauce turn into a crisis of shrinking brand sales?
In fact, the fact that, in the AI era, businesses use AI to save costs, save people, increase efficiency, and reduce negative rates, is in itself not a bad thing. But is it really appropriate to apply this cost logic, which is derived from industrial manufacturing, to a straight C consumer brand?
For plants with purely productive properties, reduced human performance is the technological dividend of the times, but for consumer brands, outside the plant, production line and channels, consumer preferences, trust, emotional premiums... These are factored into profit.
After all, the reputation of the brand has fallen and the damage is often greater than expected.
When Godmother resisted the wave, there was a lot of “fate” in the market, arguing that the impact of the cyber boycott was limited to online. As a traditional consumer brand under the deep-crop line for decades, online channels accounted for less than their overall revenue, and the wave of opinion caused at best short-term fluctuations in online sales, making it difficult to hurt their fundamentals.
This is also confirmed by open data, which have been reported in the media as almost “disconnected” in previous years.
WeChat Official Account stopped in March 2022 and Douyin was rarely broadcast live. With less than 5 per cent of electricity sales, online marketing costs account for 30 per cent of the total budget, businesses disband live teams and lower-centre feeder channels. The market share of the three core products of Godmothers was over 16 per cent in the third quarter of 2025, relying on the channel advantage of the country ' s supermarket and wife shop.
The winning data show that in 2022 and 2025, the share of the country's hot pepper sauce segment was about 55 per cent, ranking first in the industry; in the larger medium-temperate sauce track, the total market share of its brands was about 16 per cent, also ranked first, with three core items, such as chili pepper, under the flag, occupying the top three of the medium-temperate list.
But does online public opinion really have a small impact on an under-line consumer brand? If the old logic of “channel to king” continues to be used to measure brand risks of the social age, it is somewhat biased, after all, beyond being an independent distribution channel on the line, more often than not, a cognitive premise for the entire consumer decision-making process.
The typical pre-car was farmers ' springs and sea sauce, often the higher the national brand and the greater the public opinion.
As a two-line consumer brand, farmer mountain springs used to say in the annual newspaper: As brand image has been tested historically, the market share of packaging of drinking water products has been declining for three months. In 2024, the Consortium recorded revenues of $15,952 million for packaging of drinking water products, approximately $4.3 billion less than in the previous year, a decrease of 21.3 per cent over the same period and a decline in the share of total income from 49.7 per cent to 37.2 per cent in the previous year.
This directly led to the first withdrawal of the farmer ' s water-packing operation to the company ' s second largest source of income in that year. More notably, there is a certain continuity in the loss of national brand names and, to date, the wave of resistance on the Internet has receded, while some of the highly emotional sticky users are permanently lost.
There is no exception to the fact that there has been a crisis of opinion in the ocean over the additive “double standard”, and the consequences of damage to brand reputations on the capital and sales side remain “heavi”. According to information received, the seafood industry evaporated within one day at a market value of approximately $36 billion.
Convergence at the end of the sale was frustrated, and Sandalwood electrician monitoring data showed an overall increase of 54 per cent in the sauce in October of that year, while sales of sea sauce products decreased by 32 per cent in comparison to the main electric power platform. The seafood industry even lost its top market position in the sauce line during the month.
Returning to the godmother herself, its public opinion is probably more vulnerable to risk than the farmers' springs and seafood industry.
The latter have at least a mature public relations and online operating system, capable of gradually repairing consumer perceptions through official statements, linked marketing and user communication. But the “disappearance” of the Internet over the years meant that the brand lost some repair capacity in the social sphere.
On 27 October, the BUG column reported that supermarkets and convenience stores in some areas had seen the removal of the mother from the shelf.
Second, unlike farmers' springs and sea skyscrapers, godmother's brand stories have been linked to the bottom-up narratives of “blank start-up” “minor attack”, which have naturally generated some consumer sympathy. And this is an Al farce that subverts past brands and is a key reason why countless Internet users cannot accept it.
However, the penetration of AI into the consumer sector has become irreversible, and more brands will follow the so-called efficiency card game, with even more extreme reductions and more visible efficiency figures emerging. Godmother, let the industry figure out another thing: the value of technological progress should not be at the expense of removing the emotional roots of the brand.
Is AI “dismantling” the minimum humanity of traditional consumer brands?
Looking at the global consumer manufacturing chain, AI has two main areas of penetration: back end manufacturing, front end marketing.
In particular, since 2026, there have been a number of “AI Marketing Rolls” on consumer tracks, including Soupor and Baby Sheep, with statistics showing that, in the first half of this year alone, more than 10 brands have been aroused by AI advertising. Of these, Supor ' s AI advertising appears to have hit stock prices.
Jasper AI reports indicate that 91 per cent of global marketing teams have routinely used AI tools for their work.
It is worth mentioning that the global head-consumer brand is already working on the AI model. For example, Pepsi built the Pepsi X platform, Nestlé launched an in-house NesGPT, Procter built the “AI factory”, Coca-Cola established the Chief Digital Officer, and Unilever moved the data platform to Google Clouds...
It also makes sense, after all, that “marketing” is indelibly important for consumer brands, and that even a good marketing once is a direct driver of brand sales growth, which leads to marketing costs that tend to dominate a fast-moving brand.
Data show that a typical fast-moving group, which spends between 10 and 20 per cent of its revenues annually on advertising, promotion and consumer communication, spends billions of dollars or billions of dollars. However, if AI were to be connected, this expenditure should be significantly lower and more efficient than the artificial age.
For the time being, Nestlé, Procter and Unilever, among others, have published their own transformation of AI.
In the case of Nestlé, the Virtual Sales Assistant at Nestlé was able to save between 20 and 35 per cent of the time on the pilot market for sales personnel; the Procter and Impact Analytics smart shelf management tool, RackSmart, was tested on the Brazilian market and the stock shortage rate was reduced by 15 per cent.
The Sketch Pro, developed by Unilever in partnership with IPG Studios, integrates several AI platforms, such as Adobe Firefly and Google Veo 3, and is able to transform the concept into a consumer-tested asset within two hours. At the same time, the AI passenger service on the main electrician platforms has flourished.
While the figures on the efficiency statements are on the run, the logic of the downscaling is straightforward and tempting. But aside from this, should the closest consumer track to “humanism” be collectively turned to AI, and can the minimum human face of the brand remain?
First, consumers have become aware of the flow of water-lined AI ads, mechanical rigid AI customers, and the lack of a basic living sense in brand communications. Gartner ' s consumer survey of publish in March 2026 showed that 50 per cent of United States consumers had expressed a preference for not using an AI-generated brand.
Consumers have the same negative feelings about the spread of the AI service when it comes to after-sales. In the first half of 2026, the publish of the China-China Committee for the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CPA) conducted an analysis of complaints received by the National Committee for the Elimination of Discrimination against Women in the first half of 2026, in which for the first time, the issue of the services of visitors to AI was named as a new hotspot for complaints.
Of course, the most worrying thing is that AI is more efficient than consumers' grievances and inconveniences, and will not lead to job substitution.
In fact, “AI replacement manpower” was already a sensitive issue of global consumer nerves before Godmother ignited the storm of public opinion, except that no brand was willing to acknowledge it positively. But a record of layoffs and organizational adjustments across major consumer giants reveals that this global “job” is unsettling and becomes an inescapable reality.
In the case of Nestlé, for example, it was known that the Nestlé programme would reduce its workforce globally by about 16,000 over the next two years. Of these, some 12,000 are white-collar professionals, which by the end of 2027 will have contributed to the annual savings of 1 billion Swiss francs (twice the originally planned 500 million Swiss francs); the related one-time restructuring costs are expected to be twice the annual savings.
Behind the collective silence of the brand, there are many business plans that merit reflection.
For example, in 2025, Procter announced a reduction of up to 7,000 non-manufacturing jobs over the next two years, or about 15 per cent of the total number of such jobs; Unilever also proposed a reduction of 7,500 staff (5.9 per cent of the total number of employees) over the next three years, saving 800 million euros.
There are signs that mother-in-law flutter seems to be a prelude to the AI era.
It's not the first brand to trigger a boycott, let alone the last. Even resistance and protest give consumers some consumer rights and positions. But when the whole industry enters the same fast lane of AI, the mood goes out, what does it change?
Will it stop the Ai line or will it stop the giants' layoffs?
This question is clearly not answered.
Will “manual” again become the price premium for the consumer track?
Looking back at the changing times of the last industrial revolution, machines have covered the mass consumer market in extreme value terms, replacing industrial products that come out of hand and water lines. It has also transformed “manual” production from backward, inefficient to high-end, expensive and scarce pronouns, which have underpinned a luxury brand premium and become a non-obsolete commercial logic.
For example, the official response to the persistent emphasis on “hand-to-hand” “carving time” of the “Beda Emerald,” the “Dantons of Jiang,” the “one-smith, one-pack”, and the “knitting bag” of the MiU MiU up to US$ 5950 is too expensive to be questioned.
Even in the area of mass consumption, this law is equally valid.
The machine-sized bakery over here is full of supermarket shelves, where the price of the handmade ready-made bakery can be 30-50 per cent higher.
Now, can the tide of the AI wave make “manual” again the price premium for the consumer track?
It cannot be denied that today, whether it be the content track or the manufacturing end, the “handshow” has become the three best words of the era to anchor the brand identity and value-separating track.
The short video platform, “Handing everything”, has been broadcast over 5 billion times; the tea-drinking brand, which likes to promote “Hand-to-Hand-Hand, Classic-Turkish Processes”, runs out of high-end routes on the extreme track; the non-remaining food, hand-written brand, likes to mark “Turn-Turn-Wild, No-Ai” on the detailed pages; and the pure hand-made short play ENEMY, which plays over 1 billion times on the entire platform, has become its most visible dissemination label.
It appears that the more AI is available, the less manual it is, the cheaper it is to standardize, the more valuable it is.
In the beginning of 2026, the media raised the question of what was the most valuable in 2026. The answer is certainly alive.
A number of retail brands have been known to have emerged abroad as “refuting back” and to abandon efficiency and human capital. A typical example is the United States supermarket chain Trader Joe's, which has launched a boom on social networks, actively rejecting the mainstream business model, retaining only about 4000 SKUs, and insisting on manual cash collections rather than automatic closure machines.
Olea, Unilever, uses AI to make a difference while beginning to restrain the use of AI for advertising. The Global Handicraft Electrician Platform Etsy Q1 in 2026 showed a 27 per cent increase in “handmade”-related searches over the same period, up five years. Artificial leather, handcrafted pottery, manual frame books, etc., are the objects of a significant increase in the speed of the platform.
And consumers are indeed willing to pay a higher premium for “manual”. A 2026 survey by the market research institute Nelson showed that 68 per cent of consumers worldwide expressed a willingness to pay a 10 to 30 per cent premium for creative products clearly labelled “man-made” “no-AI participation”.
This indirectly led to the abandonment of traditional stationery as early as the Internet.
The Belgian brand of the notebook, Moleskine, under the banner of D'Ieteren, increased organic sales by more than 6 per cent in the first half of the year, after years of decline; Newell Brands, with brands such as Sharpie, PaperSmart Mate, which has increased stock prices by about 60 per cent since 2026; and The Worlds, a chain of British books and handicrafts, which has nearly tripled this year.
The Financial Times is also known to name “anti-AI consumption mix” for groups that persist globally.
Is this round of manual consumption the same path of development as the previous round of manual consumption?
The last round of the manual premium was due to the fact that many precision calibrations, complex processes, non-standardized details were dependent on human hands, and the market eventually developed two patterns: mass consumption was driven by machines and the high price was carried by hand. The variety of customers and values, and the limited size of artisanal brands, make it difficult to impact the mass market.
The scarcity of this wave is largely the result of proactive consumer choices.
It is a sad question just how many options consumers have in the flood of efficiency. Perhaps the end of the era of AI, which was marked by a confused collective backlash, will end with nothing more than praise, memory, memory, and no real victory.
Auto-fetched and translated by AI Atlas. All rights belong to the original author.