“I used to be glad within the haze of a drunken hour / However heaven is aware of I am depressing now,” goes The Smiths’ lyric, suggesting that these doing Dry January are struggling double.
When you’re feeling extra melancholy than regular, it may need one thing to do with the third Monday of January looming forward, a day that’s been often known as ‘Blue Monday’ – or essentially the most miserable day of the 12 months – since 2005. Now, Blue Monday could be very a lot a social assemble; one constructed by this very trade. The thought was first disseminated in a press launch from Sky Journey and the date was calculated utilizing an ‘system’ that checked out components like climate, debt, time since Christmas, and motivation ranges.
If that seems like pseudoscience that’s as a result of it’s, however we are able to’t ignore society’s nihilistic flip as of just lately. There’s the local weather disaster doomsday clock, political polarisation, and rising revenue inequality; many individuals are even turning their again on relationship. Ostensibly, residing via ‘polycrisis’ or ‘permacrisis’, excessive inflation, enshittification, and a bunch of different miserable buzzwords that seize the temper of right now, isn’t placing a smile on anybody’s face. Oh, and we now have AI ‘slop’ to deal with now too. Analysis backs this up: In accordance with Ipsos, solely 31% of individuals say they’re optimistic concerning the world on the whole over the subsequent 12 months, and persons are discovering that conventional milestones and aspirations are more and more out of attain.
So what are manufacturers doing? Ought to they be doing something? Confidence and optimism drive exercise, what do manufacturers do when nobody feels up for something? Can manufacturers discover a position in cheering individuals up, or is {that a} surefire strategy to irritate individuals much more? Or maybe there are alternative ways to strategy the strain and pessimism.
LBB’s Zhenya Tsenzharyk posed this conundrum to the trade’s leaders – their responses are under.
Anna Fitzpatrick
Senior strategist at BBH
Nihilists would possibly get the info flawed, however they usually get the sentiments proper.
So in case you’re going to leverage nihilism, begin with empathy.
Firstly, as a result of it is the appropriate factor to do.
Let me be clear: manufacturers should not the answer to nihilism. However each model has an ethical duty to not make nihilism worse by fuelling mistrust or inflaming division.
Secondly, as a result of empathy is rocket gasoline for resonance.
By getting underneath the pores and skin of how one thing feels – and feeling it too – we are able to shine a light-weight on unstated tensions, tinder for comedian reduction. And because the saying goes: laughter is the shortest distance between two individuals.
So don’t deal with nihilists as an issue to repair, or worse – an summary object of mental examine.
Begin by spending time with them.
Mel Arrow
CSO at McCann London
The late, nice David Lynch as soon as stated – preserve your eye on the doughnut fairly than the outlet within the center. It’s an ode to optimism and it’s how I intention to dwell my life. It’s actually arduous, nevertheless, when the outlet is such a war-torn, badly tanned distraction. At McCann, we’ve been learning the temper of Britain for many years. Its evolution over time, via monetary and political crises and patches of sporting success, make for an attention-grabbing learn. One factor that’s true of this present chapter, is that whereas nationwide optimism is down, group optimism is up. Ask how we really feel as a rustic and unsure is essentially the most chosen phrase. Ask how we really feel in our houses, households, communities, fandoms and groups and optimism is alive and effectively. So, if we’re making an attempt to refocus the nation on the doughnut, rousing state of the nation addresses from manufacturers may not be the best way to do it. However enabling, heroing, and even giving again to the pockets of pleasure in our lives could be. And now, I’m hungry…
Ben Peckett
Group artistic director at Amplify
In a world that more and more feels take, take, take and all about consuming extra, perhaps it’s time for us to take inventory. Wouldn’t it’s refreshing if manufacturers took rather less time to promote to us and a bit extra time to attach with us? Gymshark did it brilliantly with its Deload Barbershop in 2022. Now think about if that had been an all out dedication to everlasting areas designed to counter the gloom fairly than only a week lengthy pop up.
Promoting isn’t and shouldn’t be right here to resolve the world’s (or the person’s) issues. Let’s take inspiration from the current Waitrose ‘whodunnit?’, and Uber One’s Brian Cox Goes To Faculty advert, and intention to make work that stands out and raises a smile. Our work ought to brighten somebody’s day. So let’s give somebody a motive to look at a 30 second spot in a Corrie advert break fairly than making a brew, or get them to double-take that billboard double-entendre from the bus, or convincing them to spend half-hour immersed in an expertise designed to wrap a better-feeling world round them.
Let’s be entertaining. Perhaps if we set out with that ambition from the off, we’d all really feel rather less doomy.
Ivy Escopete
Senior technique marketing consultant at Cheil UK
Customers hate nothing greater than when manufacturers begin to take part on life’s distress and kind pity events. Whereas individuals might not be as optimistic concerning the world, it doesn’t imply that they need to embrace pessimism. Individuals need to be glad and are keen to combat for it. The right response from manufacturers is to assist them in that combat – not simply with tacky motivational advertising and marketing messages, however by actively contributing to a greater world. For instance, if manufacturers publish messages like ‘Brighter Days Forward’, they need to again them up by implementing sustainable practices to make sure these brighter days truly come. Cheering individuals up with empty guarantees gained’t resonate. Working with them to create a genuinely brighter future is the best way ahead.
Ringo Moss
Chief technique officer at McCann Central
That is Advantageous: Manufacturers Do not Must Be the Antidote to Nihilism.
When individuals begin feeling a bit “what’s the purpose?”, it’s tempting to suppose manufacturers ought to swoop in and save the day. For some time, the model function period made us imagine manufacturers ought to repair the world’s issues, however that’s at all times been a tall order. And now, it feels much more unrealistic.
The truth is that manufacturers aren’t speculated to be superheroes. They exist to be acquainted and constant, and due to that, simple to decide on and purchase. And maybe that’s all they have to be right now. Dependable.
It appears apparent no person needs compelled cheerfulness after they’re feeling weighed down with the world, but entrepreneurs proceed to fall into that lure. When the world feels unsure, a continuing stream of rainbows and unicorns is extra annoying than uplifting. So as an alternative of ignoring or making an attempt to erase the unstable uncertainty of the world, perhaps we are able to empathise with it. Let’s acknowledge the chaos with a wink and a nod, share a little bit of humour, and be there with one thing individuals can rely on.
Individuals don’t want manufacturers to repair every little thing or faux every little thing’s tremendous, they simply need just a little consistency within the insanity. It’s so simple as the espresso that’s at all times good, the sneakers that at all times match, a marketing campaign that makes individuals smile, or a value promise with out phrases and circumstances. Being dependable and honest is sufficient – certainty is the true antidote to chaos.
In a world filled with uncertainty, entrepreneurs and types create certainty by staying true to who they’re, of their product, pricing and types, day in and day trip. The objective isn’t to repair the world, however to make life just a little extra predictable and rather a lot simpler.
Richard Armstrong
Associate at MSQ/Maintain
It’s a well known proven fact that working in sustainability is usually a little bit of a downer. Actually, there’s a brand new area of interest of administration coaches that’s emerged – simply to assist sustainability-types address our perpetual doom and gloom, our emotions of pointlessness and failure. We had been stunned IPSOS managed to search out 31 individuals who had been even vaguely optimistic about 2025 – from the place we’re sitting, it’s all arrange properly to be a blockbuster bumper version of bleakness. Drill child, drill.
Alternatively, when expectations are so low, each win turns into a WIN. There’s maybe a motive why we at MSQ/Maintain have by no means been busier. Manufacturers which have one thing constructive to say, who’ve made commitments and are sticking to them, all of the sudden they actually actually need to inform the world. Pushing upstream towards the torrent of plastic-infused effluent, these little salmon of hope are glimmering within the sunshine. It’s as if it means extra, issues extra when throughout is Blue Monday. Doing the appropriate factor – which, let’s be sincere was green-ish wallpaper a number of years in the past when everybody was ‘doing the appropriate factor’ – is now an opportunity to face out, be a bit brighter and a bit braver. That is what retains our peckers up, and hopefully will unfold just a little gentle at nighttime this 12 months, lengthy after we’ve blown the worldwide carbon funds earlier than Dry January is over…[oh no, there I go again…].
Agalia Tan
Senior planner at We Are Social Singapore
Confidence and optimism come when you could have a way of excessive self-efficacy, which hinges on two components: your capacity to attain the objective, and the stated objective.
It’s true that our exterior circumstances just like the rising price of residing, political local weather and revenue inequality impacts our perceived capacity to attain a objective. However what must be mentioned, and what actually is in our locus of management is the objective itself, or because the query states, conventional milestones and aspirations.
Though the world has advanced dramatically over the many years, our objectives and what we use to measure them by (i.e. riches, standing, development and glamour) have remained pretty fixed. Due to that, it’s little doubt that individuals start to really feel disenchanted when the world is shifting in the direction of a brand new means of being and but, they’re always bombarded by messages that strain you to proceed hustling in the direction of conventional milestones and aspirations.
It’s simple to neglect that advertising and marketing has an influence to vary the items by which we’re measuring tradition, or the metrics we use to measure our success by.
As a substitute of pondering of the world as a static sandbox the place manufacturers and entrepreneurs are to adapt to its guidelines, entrepreneurs ought to do not forget that they’ve the ability to affect what society is being attentive to, and what we in flip will worth and try in the direction of.
Take for instance, IKEA’s ‘Present Your Savvy’ marketing campaign which confirmed how being sensible and resourceful in furnishing your house is equally or much more satisfying than spending some huge cash on grand, luxurious gadgets. Towards the backdrop of a rising price of residing disaster, such social realism is widely known and welcomed by customers.
More and more, it is going to be the crucial of entrepreneurs to be sure that manufacturers are working in sync with new items of tradition, fairly than reinforcing outdated perception methods.
Kevin Tiedgen
Govt director of knowledge & AI at Jung von Matt
Occasions of disaster breed subcultures and extra. When actuality feels insufferable, individuals search their very own secure havens, establishing micro-worlds inside which they will discover solace. Mark Zuckerberg as soon as promised connection, but we’re now lonelier than ever. Promoting alone can’t save the world, nor can it obliterate algorithms. Nevertheless, creativity traditionally usually thrives when it confronts societal failings or breaks with modifications in society completely. Promoting is primarily a capitalistic instrument. Nonetheless, it may well create emotional resonance and supply moments of escapism. Quoting Charli XCX, “There isn’t any clarification for what I do (…) chaos and destruction,” we see that pushing boundaries would possibly invigorate new expressions of id. Manufacturers should acknowledge this rigidity between isolation and rising communities the place real connections are shaped. By using emotional storytelling, collaborative initiatives, and user-driven content material, manufacturers can construct belief and visibility, permitting these enclaves of hope to flourish. In flip, they transfer past transactional relationships, fostering areas the place individuals genuinely need to have interaction. As a substitute of pretending to resolve grand societal points, they will supply tangible backing and uplifting narratives, exhibiting that there’s nonetheless room for optimism, progress, and shared humanity—even in occasions of disaster.
Martin Severs
Head of technique at Collaborate
I hate the idea of Blue Monday as a result of it virtually lays a pre-set expectation to be unhappy. And I’ve at all times discovered that with so many issues ‘anticipation is worse than actuality’.
It’s actually true that manufacturers typically have to butt out of individuals’s lives. We’re awash with issue-based messages when, on the finish of the day, you merely need to butter your toast or season your salad.
However we are able to be taught a lot from leisure as a long-time morale booster in tough occasions – offering a much-needed sense of escapism from battle, ailing well being and the hardships of on a regular basis life. How? Typically via providing up some safety via the reassurance of standard seasonal exercise: January is SO a lot better for the return of The Traitors, the shut of November tingles with pre-Christmas pleasure when IACGMOOH arrives.
Who doesn’t get a kick annually from the massive Christmas window shows – an anticipated expertise that spreads pleasure. Or suppose Coca-Cola. This beverage big’s Christmas vehicles and comms are massive glad moments – but the model makes waves too with its Halloween, Easter, and Valentine’s day advertising and marketing.
It’s a protracted sport for manufacturers, however making a ritual that types part of customers’ rhythm can present a way of safety with out being an excessive amount of of an imposition. And cheer us all up alongside the best way.
Phil Jeffery
Affiliate artistic director at TRO
To be sincere, I feel it’s fairly self-indulgent throughout a time of extreme unpredictability on the planet for a model to be pondering “how does this have an effect on mEeEeE?”
A product or punchy marketing campaign isn’t going to remedy the general public’s existential dread. I feel a model must be the equal of the one that comes over after a break-up: the one who doesn’t hit you with the top tilt asking “How are you doing? Are you okay? How are you doing although?”, however who will get what you’re going via and simply sits there, not forcing something, offering a little bit of consolation within the second.
It is at all times tempting for a model to leap on the zeitgeist-consuming points – facet be aware, watch Bo Burnham’s social model marketing consultant sketch from ‘Inside’ – however in darkish occasions, simply being the *factor* that connects with individuals within the small moments is what may carry essentially the most worth to the world.
Helen Rose
Managing accomplice at the7stars
May 2025 be the 12 months we free January from its negativity bias?
The macro geopolitical and financial challenges we discover ourselves going through should not distinctive to the flip of the 12 months. Actually, there’s rather a lot to really feel constructive about within the 12 months forward.
Simply this week, we polled the7stars Pulse Panel, with two-thirds ranking 2025 as “going okay thus far,” and an much more optimistic 1 in 10 describing the brand new 12 months as “off to an important begin.”
Our analysis highlighted two key areas of precedence for British customers this 12 months: “having enjoyable” and “extra journey.” This means there’s a transparent urge for food for glad occasions forward.
As for proper now and the looming Blue Monday, lower than half of Brits say they really really feel depressed on that day. I’d argue it’s a day that’s ripe for a rebrand – so ditch the inauthentic empathy or false positivity, and as an alternative give attention to what actually issues to individuals this 12 months.
Peter Wilson
Govt technique director at Iris
It’s been over 20 years because the time period ‘Blue Monday’ was reportedly coined, so it’s most likely about time to replace our vocabulary and reference factors.
We’ve been residing via a compounding ‘polycrisis’ and a relentless information cycle that always feels not simply dystopian however totally deranged. So an terrible lot of individuals aren’t simply feeling ‘Blue Monday’, they’re feeling perpetually disoriented and frightened. They’ve reached ‘empathy saturation’ they usually want coping mechanisms to assist them take care of the bleakness of all of it. They don’t want one other anodyne model function or set of sympathetic values.
As when confronted with any risk, a primal alternative should be made. Both we assist individuals tackle the combat with sensible utilities and companies. Or we assist them take flight by offering escapism via leisure and silliness. To borrow from Nick Cave, we’ve all had an excessive amount of sorrow; now could be the time for pleasure.
Aimee Luther
MD at The Liberty Guild
We’re doomed. Midway to hell in a handcart. If something it’s gotten worse since Ipsos took that ballot. Perhaps manufacturers ought to simply pull the quilt up and return to sleep until 2026. When persons are even turning their again on DATING, a straw of potential happiness to know at – we should be correctly depressing. If individuals can’t even be motivated to attach with one another, the possibilities of wanting to attach with a model looks like a bloody lengthy shot.
Bear in mind in lockdown when adland lurched in the direction of that ‘we’re all on this collectively’ happy-clappy-warm-feelgood-direction? It was toe-curling wasn’t it? It’s humorous how when manufacturers attempt to get a line into the zeitgeist, they stunning a lot at all times miss and are available out as tone-deaf.
So please. Do not do it. What are you able to, as a fast-moving shopper items or a monetary service, do within the face of vengeful mom nature, pig-headed nation states, or rogue social media platforms? Sadly the reply is nothing. Anyway, it is not what you say, it is what you do.
Lengthy earlier than covid there was model philanthropy, however the pandemic made it a factor. Manufacturers obtained used to ‘doing good’ throughout lockdown. However we’ve shortly forgotten it. Perhaps the issues we see down the pike can transfer us again to that just a little bit. In spite of everything, kindness, removed from being light, is definitely good for enterprise, and good for the world.
Jessica Treasure
Head of technique at Bountiful Cow
Escapism in pessimistic occasions is a effectively evidenced, evolutionary human behaviour. We address aggravating conditions, by participating with storytelling and play to decrease our cortisol ranges, offering psychological respite.
We see this demonstrated as a collective cultural response time and time once more, from the rise of Disney throughout WW2 to digital actuality surging throughout the covid pandemic.
Promoting and comms must also be a type of leisure and escapism.
However promoting has develop into ‘boring’, as analysis by Adam Morgan and Peter Area highlighted of their work ‘The Value of Uninteresting’. They discovered that ‘boring’ promoting is widespread (48% of B2C advertisements) and doesn’t work very arduous. Equally at Bountiful Cow our ‘Relative Benefit’ analysis with the IPA discovered that not following the ‘boring’ herd pays again.
We have to transfer away from the wallpaper of purely rational messaging and give attention to creating content material that grabs consideration and makes individuals sit up and take discover. By reflecting what actually issues to people and their communities, we’d simply encourage a number of to speak concerning the model—and even purchase what it’s promoting.
Take EE’s current model relaunch – it is visually in-your-face and it makes you smile as a result of it’s completely relatable. The mum’s hug within the Playdate advert? That was actually my weekend! Add to that an important soundtrack and the result’s entertaining and memorable, and perhaps subsequent time I would like to change cell suppliers, I simply would possibly bear in mind these advertisements.
Wanda Pogue
Chief Technique Officer at VaynerMedia
The grim finish to 2024 and a good darker begin to 2025 introduced a way of pessimism. Nevertheless, individuals stay resilient and discover methods to deal with the realities of the world round them.
A vice is good: 2025 has already been coined the 12 months of “identical me…perhaps even barely worse.” Many individuals are maintaining their unhealthy habits and leaning into their vices – the world does not seem to be it is getting higher, so why ought to they? Manufacturers can place themselves because the feel-good indulgence customers search.
Bingo: A brand new 12 months brings new objectives that deserve celebrations. Amid the chaos, individuals crave progress and momentum. A strategy to seize that is via DIY Bingo playing cards for 2025 predictions. This enables people to trace their objectives and rejoice small victories alongside the best way. Manufacturers can create or help these Bingo challenges to assist individuals see that progress continues to be attainable.
Humour within the absurd: In a sea of unhealthy information, persons are in search of bits of reduction. Over-the-top comedic content material topped the charts. Whereas this isn’t for all manufacturers — and we warning towards being tone-deaf — as individuals search to flee actuality, manufacturers can supply a light-hearted refuge.”
Armando Potter
Head of technique at 72andSunny Amsterdam
Optimism is the core worth of 72andSunny. But when we wish optimism to combat 2025’s doom and gloom, optimism wants a rebrand. As a result of that ‘everything-is-awesome’ veneer that optimism has fallen stereotype to, gained’t work. At greatest it’s annoying tone deafness. At worst it is poisonous positivity. So how can optimism tackle 2025 in a means that makes the world rally round us as an alternative of rejecting us?
Make optimism an act of revolt. If angst is in, then optimism is a challenger. And it needn’t be challenged quietly. The world of labor isn’t working, so Certainly is on a mission to make the world work higher. Calling out job injustices alongside the best way. Bear in mind optimism is just not altruistic, it’s opportunistic. It seems to be at any scenario — regardless of how arduous it might sound – and goes, “Hell yeah, I can do it.” It’s Zurich asking “What May Go Proper?” in an insurance coverage class obsessive about going flawed. Or TikTok turning its platform for play into enterprise for small companies. Lastly, keep away from empty enthusiasm. Actual optimism is empowering, inspiring hope via significant acts of change. Like e.l.f. pressuring firms to create extra gender equality within the office with its ‘Change the Boardgame’ initiative.
Megha Parikh
Head of technique at VML
Nihilism’s shadow looms giant, colouring our collective outlook a muted gray. Current polls reveal a decline in world optimism, with many feeling conventional milestones are more and more out of attain. Overshadowed by the local weather disaster, political divides, and financial inequality, even elementary human pursuits are dropping their enchantment. This pervasive sense of ‘meh’ presents a novel problem for entrepreneurs: how do you ignite motion when hope looks like a flickering flame?
The knee-jerk response could be to counter this perceived negativity with a dose of cheer. However I feel this strategy misunderstands the character of contemporary nihilism. It’s not essentially a descent into unhappiness or despair, however a rising numbness, an lack of ability to really feel a lot of something in any respect. This mirrors a standard false impression about melancholy – it’s much less about pervasive unhappiness and extra about an absence of feeling, a void the place feelings used to reside.
Our present period, saturated with fixed crises, has dulled our emotional responses. Like a nervous system bombarded with adrenaline, our collective capability for shock has diminished. Occasions nonetheless register as constructive or unfavourable, however the depth, the shock, the sensation is muted. We’ve develop into accustomed to the extraordinary, leaving us craving one thing actually novel to pierce the veil of indifference.
That is the place advertising and marketing can adapt. Nostalgic, feel-good campaigns, whereas comforting, threat fading into the background. As a substitute, I see a surge within the effectiveness of novelty, absurdism, and sudden artistic selections. Individuals aren’t essentially in search of solace; they’re in search of distraction, a break from the relentless barrage of unhealthy information. Current leisure tendencies spotlight this longing for escapism. And within the promoting world, we’re already seeing a resurgence of humor, usually tinged with absurdity. Assume Liquid Loss of life; Duolingo; and others. They lower via as a result of they’re sudden, participating via their sheer audacity.
Lastly, I’ve to say – let’s preserve perspective. The world is undoubtedly going through severe challenges – the fires in LA put such a harsh gentle on that this week. However life, in its mundane magnificence, continues. We nonetheless have to navigate the on a regular basis – to offer for our households, discover moments of pleasure, and join with one another. Advertising and promoting play a job on this ongoing narrative, not by providing false cheer, however by offering participating distractions, sparking curiosity, and reminding us that even within the face of uncertainty, there’s nonetheless room for laughter and the sudden.
Jamie Bell
Govt artistic director at The Maverick Group
Actual life was extra surreal than something Armando Iannucci may have written. World environmental chaos, megalomaniac politicians, AI threating to do each job from street sweeping to punk poetry, and a brand new Chancellor that compelled a collective moan from everybody. It was, and is, bloody grim. So, the truth that a 3rd of persons are ‘gloomy as fuck’(tm) is hardly a shock. However what if that is the second for promoting to step up and inject some pleasure again into the cracks between the doom and gloom of 24 hour information?
We’re within the enterprise emotion. The suitable emotional set off is essentially the most highly effective factor there may be. And constructive emotional responses are king of the citadel. We all know this as a result of we’re within the hearts and minds enterprise. Individuals purchase extra from manufacturers that make them really feel good than they do from every other. Make me smile, give me an emotional profit and my hand is already trying to find my pockets.
Bear in mind the 80s and 90s? Promoting wasn’t nearly promoting merchandise. It was about bringing pleasure and escapism. It was usually extra entertaining the programming it was sandwiched between. Take into consideration the enduring campaigns: the ice-skating pandas, tea consuming monkeys and brief sketches about how brill’yant milk is. These had been greater than advertisements, they had been moments, created not simply to shift product, however to carry pleasure.
That is the sort of promoting we want in 2025. Overlook chasing quick clicks and fast conversions. Manufacturers aren’t constructed on the laziness of a fast sale. They’re constructed on long-term emotional reward, and pleasure that retains individuals coming again. Within the face of uncertainty, we have to remind individuals about what makes them glad.
So, let’s get again to what we do greatest: creating pleasure, profitable hearts, and turning groans into progress. As a result of when a model places a smile on a face and lights a fuse inside us, everybody wins.
