Calling B.S. Part 1: Authenticity

Back in 2008, we wrote with some alarm about how the assertion of “authenticity” had taken firm root in the lexicon of branding. Over the ensuing seven years, the word has enjoyed the reproductive fecundity of the Oryctolagus cuniculus. There are now, by our rough estimate 184,597,433,860 references to authenticity used to brand products and services.

We’ve had it. With “authentic experiences” and “one-hundred percent authentic” products and even “fake authenticity,” labeling a brand “authentic” has approximately the same communicative value as Dilbert’s Pointy-Haired Boss proclaiming, “Our differentiating value-added strategy is transformational change.” The word authenticity has devolved to the point of meaninglessness.

Part of the problem, our resident anthropologist asserts, is actually a vexing philosophical one. According to 20th century philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, most great debates of philosophy—just like our revulsion at the use of the term “authenticity” to hawk products and experiences that are anything but authentic—are inherent problems in using language to communicate. More specifically, many of the most puzzling of problems result from binaries in our language. Think mind/body, feminine/masculine, human/animal and of course, authentic/inauthentic. We can only think and communicate using the language that we have, but most things in reality lie somewhere along a continuum.

“So what,” gentle reader, you might ask? Language is messy. This reality is of no is help in brand strategy where the whole point is to distill and clarify of language for businesses and other organizations. Messy or not, the word clearly means something, and something quite important, to a lot of people these days.

As the Authentic Brand Index defines it, authenticity “is about practicing what you preach; being totally clear about who you are and what you do best.” Inarguable, right? But how does this make authenticity any different from “honesty” or “sincerity”? Under this definition, some of the most absurdly synthetic of products, services and brands fit just as comfortably authentic as grandma’s home cooking. Take the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas, for instance. The Venetian makes no effort to conceal its artifice and in fact celebrates it. No patrons believe that they are actually in Venice, Italy when they visit the Venetian. They know they are being lied to and they love it! As author Umberto Eco once said, “The American imagination demands the real thing and, to attain it, must fabricate the absolute fake.” By this logic, “honest lies” are indeed authentic.

One might dismiss our argument as nothing more than linguistic sophistry. If we are being led into such absurdities, we probably are not using the right word for what we are talking about. Why have so many brands hopped on the authenticity bandwagon? Because of the real power it has on perceptions. Through a study on authentic sounding labeling, Brian Wansink, a marketing professor at Cornell University, showed just how great of an effect “authenticity” can have. He found that when menu items included references to geographical locations (“traditional Cajun”) or had nostalgic labels (“Grandma’s recipe”), patrons were more likely to purchase them and believe that they tasted better. No wonder Jordan Belfort, the model for Leonardo Dicaprio’s character In the film Wolf of Wall Street uses an established “authentic” sounding name for his illegal stock boiler room, Stratton Oakmont, for this very reason—to game people into thinking his company was “authentic.” Effective, but disingenuous.

What is actually wrong with being inauthentic? It hurts even to raise the question given how charged the term is. Everyone wants to be authentic and everyone thinks they want authentic things. The reason, again, goes back to the philosophy of language. Every binary comes loaded with a moral hierarchy. Think of natural/artificial. No one wants to be artificial. But why not? So much of what makes our constructed world so great is because of artifice. How great is it that we can sleep in artificial homes vs. test our luck each night exposed to the natural elements! Why not be a champion of artificiality then? It’s certainly been a lonelier place post-Eric Schlosser, but it’s always been hard because our language places a great moral weight on natural over artificial. Every time you hear someone complain about “artificial” texting technology ruining “natural” human interaction, you are up close and personal with this binary.

Here’s another problem. As marketers, we often don’t have the luxury of positioning brands simply as they are; we need to help make them better than the alternative. You’ll never see a TV with “good enough” blacks and “perfectly adequate” brightness, or a tooth paste that whitens teeth “about as well as all the other brands on the shelf.” Authenticity has become a crutch to do just this by creating a mystique around brands that fail to have sufficiently compelling distinctiveness on their own merits. It’s almost enough to send us to Barneys and plunk down $12 on a tube of Marvis Jasmin Mint Toothpaste or better yet, head over to AuthenticSelfWellness.com for a recommendation.

So what are we left with then? Basically (1) an intractable language problem that dates back to the first utterances of our ancient ancestors, (2) a demanding public that seeks a simple resolution to its complexities and (3) marketers who are only too happy to oblige. We understand. We were once authentic too. But we’ve moved into the post-authenticity era. Even though we no longer have authenticity, we do see a bright future in just one word: plastics.