Muji recently published a manifesto of its values which provides a powerful – even radical – point of view on consumer culture with specific relevance for luxury brands…
In launching its manifesto of ‘enough’, it steals the thunder of all luxury brands that are lost in a grammar of superlatives in their commnication claims…
From the Muji Manifesto…
We do not create products that lure customers into believing that “this is best” or “I must have this.” We would like our customers to feel the rational sense of satisfaction that comes not with “this is best”, but with “this is enough.” “Best” becomes “enough.”"There are degrees of “enough” however. Muji aims to raise the standard of “enough” to the greatest extenst possible. “Best” contains a fair emount of egoism and disharmony, but in “enough” we sense restraint and compromise.”This is enough.” That is Muji’s vision.
Read The full Muji Manifesto
By launching this manifesto, it jumps straight into the debate over consumer consumption that is raging in the current marketplace.
To understand how the ‘enough’ positioning is executed at Muji, we just need to look at the winner of last year’s Muji International Design competition. The winning product a drinking straw made simply of straw.
It has all the narrative impact, the emotional appeal, and the spiritual iconography of a luxury product. The designer, Yuki Iida, describes it in the following way… “The original meaning of the term “straw” was “wheat straw”. Wall art depicting people using straws of wheat to drink from have been discovered from ancient Mesopotamian ruins. Straws of wheat are forms created by nature; they are materials that return to the soil. There’s no waste in either the shape itself, or in its actual existence.
Yuji Iida’s Straw Design