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Rebekah Modrak's Learning to Talk like an (Urban) Woodsman: An Artistic Intervention project presents an artistic critique of the Best Made Co. lifestyle “axe” brand. The article and the Re Made Co. “plunger” art piece it describes engage directly with issues discussed by brand researchers and other scholars, such as the strategic use of appealing design and product aesthetics, the sign value of brands, and the creation of brand identity and cultural codes based upon the performance of an idealized, historicized and gendered mythology. The artwork itself, the reactions to the Re Made Co. project and the artist's reflections, all add to the interdisciplinary exploration of brands, brand culture and meaning.

This paper examines the concept of sustainable consumption by focusing on the consumption habits of Irish consumers. The key research findings fit into three broad and interrelated categories. Firstly, whilst recent sustainable consumption literature suggests that new research should focus on the issue of consumption, in and of itself, our study shows that consumers themselves view environmental problems from a supply and not a demand perspective. They focus on issues such as recycling and waste and not consumption itself. Secondly, our study shows that consumers have green opinions about very diverse issues and these are directly related to the individuals' lifestyles. Finally, our research shows that “material green” consumers are buying into a particular image in their consumption practices. This is very much connected to the meanings of their consumption that are derived from the communication value they attach to commodities. As such our study provides support for earlier conceptual research which su...

Here we consider whether jean Baudrillard's theory of ‘sign value’ and ‘political economy of the sign’ offer a credible alternative to economic and utilitarian definitions of value. We begin by introducing the concept of value as it has been conventionally understood, proceeding to an introduction of Baudrillard's notion of ‘sign value’. Drawing on the findings of a recently conducted research project into museum visiting, we discuss whether'sign value’ provides a credible description of the museum consumption experience. We propose that Baudrillard's theoretical contributions should neither be wholly embraced nor totally rejected. Sign value can help provide a credible explanation of the value in museum visiting, but only when conceptualised in combination with other forms of value. In particular, following Heidegger, we identify one of these different forms of value in the museum experience as ’Dasein Value'; i.e. the value of ‘being there’.