Psychology

Those who buy sports merchandise aren’t always short on self-esteem.

Those who buy sports merchandise aren’t always short on selfesteem.

So what happened to all that All Blacks merch? The All Blacksorts Licorice, the breakfast cereals with players’ faces on, blackpackaged this and silver-ferned that. And rugby jerseys, of course.

Let’s take a wee trip into the land of consumer psychology. People buy particular products for two broad reasons: instrumental and expressive. Instrumental reasons reflect the purpose or utility of the product: we buy a key ring to keep our keys together; we buy a car to get us from one place to another.

With the probable exception of the jerseys, it’s likely that all the Rugby World Cup merchandise went on special earlier than if the ABs had brought home the silverware. Instrumental purchasers will no doubt love this: they get what they need – the instrumental function – and it’s cheaper.

The other purpose these products can serve is to express something about ourselves. Key rings might keep our keys together but we all know people who have chunks of pottery or star signs hanging off them. Cars get us from A to B, but red cars make us feel fast and tell others that we feel fast.

What does All Blacks merchandise allow people to express? An obvious answer is that they’re fans. The day after a big game, you can almost guess who won by what people are wearing. More black jerseys means it’s been one of those nearly 80% of times when our national team has won. More English roses and … well, a few brave Englishman sought to beard that lion on the streets of Wellington after their semi-final win last month.

Those who do this are expressing part of their social identity – the part that gains self-esteem by virtue of positive comparisons. New Zealand is known as the most consistently strong rugby-playing nation in the world, and that helps us feel good about ourselves.

Social identity, that feeling of being part of something, is really important. It’s one of the reasons we show “ingroup” favouritism (more lollies for people who are like us) and “outgroup” derogation (calling people from other countries disparaging nicknames).

But the groups to which we belong are often threatened, and so is the social identity that goes with it. If you’re English, you can be mocked for Brexit, and if you’re a sports fan, your team doesn’t always win.

Given we invest some of our selfesteem in these things, how do we respond when that identity is threatened? I predict that, as after previous world cups we

didn’t win, we’ll see an increase in youngsters picking up other shaped balls. Or rowing, where we’ve been doing pretty well. When an identity is threatened we can “disidentify” – turn our backs and find a different way to boost self-esteem.

This means that some people who would have snapped up those All Blacksorts whatever the price before the semi-final loss will leave such products languishing on the shelves. Some might even support a different team. “I really prefer the red licorice anyway,” they may say.

We could shift the basis for our group-based comparisons. New Zealand may have scored fewer points but our boys look better in those underwear ads, or play more exciting rugby.

Or we could double down and go even harder – wear more black and white face paint, wave our banners even more enthusiastically, and shout even louder to give our team the boost they need to win.

These folk will likely not only carry on buying the merchandise, but also offset some of the sales decline from disidentifiers by buying even more. The irony is they’ll be queueing at the till with instrumental types who didn’t even watch a game but really appreciate a good deal.

Cars get us from A to B, but red cars make us feel fast and tell others that we feel fast.