Morning Brew Daily
Toby’s Trends of 2024: Dry January, Ankle Socks, Solo Dining and More
Mon, 30 Dec 2024
Episode 485: Neal and Toby recap the most memorable trends of the year including the rise of dry January, along with the rise of weed drinks. Then, ‘romantasy’ novels were all the rage as book sales skyrocketed thanks to #booktok. Also, nostalgia was a major contributor to sales as consumers make purchases with their emotions. In fashion, it was all about vintage clothing and the mob-wife aesthetic, while a generational war arose over which socks were ‘in.’ Lastly, loneliness increased in 2024, causing people to turn to AI, decorate their fridges, or simply sit on the couch and watch their favorite TV shows. Subscribe to Morning Brew Daily for more of the news you need to start your day. Share the show with a friend, and leave us a review on your favorite podcast app. Listen to Morning Brew Daily Here: https://link.chtbl.com/MBD Watch Morning Brew Daily Here: https://www.youtube.com/@MorningBrewDailyShow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Chapter 1: What trends are being discussed in 2024?
Good morning, Brew Daily Show. I'm Neil Freiman. And I'm Toby Howell. Today, a trip down memory lane as Toby relives some of his favorite trends of the year.
From Fridgescaping to Mudang and everything in between, this is the Toby's Trend Show. It's Monday, December 30th. Let's ride. Man, I am really excited for you all to hear this show. We go through so many Toby's trends in a year, but some are just flash-in-the-pan things. Remember our queen, Mu Dang, the pygmy hippo.
But some have a more lasting impact on the year, and it's those trends that Neil and I are going to talk about today.
Yep, as we are right on the cusp of 2025, it's the perfect time to look back at 2024 through the lens of these trends, because as you start to put them together, some larger themes start to emerge.
You're right, Neil. As I was looking back through each week, I noticed a lot of these topics ladder up into bigger trends. It's like a Russian nesting dolls of Toby's trends. So let's have a little fun to end the year and dive on in. Figured the best way to kick things off is to go all the way back to the beginning of the year to talk about the rise of dry January.
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Chapter 2: How did Dry January impact alcohol and cannabis sales?
Two trends stood out to me here. One, people are drinking less. Sales at three of the largest U.S. liquor stores hit a post-pandemic low during the first months of the year. Meanwhile, Google searches for dry January reached an all-time high, doubling from a year ago.
But what also stood out to me about dry January is that marijuana sales spiked during the month, as the alcohol industry's loss was the cannabis industry's gain. So Neil, it wasn't just a dry January this year. It was also a high January.
Yeah, we're looking back 11 months ago to dry January, saying it was the biggest one ever. Google searches for dry January doubled. We're coming up on a new dry January. You have to expect that it will only grow from there. You mentioned at the top that some trends are just a flash in the pan. Some may have a longer, may reflect just longer term changes in our society.
I do think that what we're seeing with people drinking less alcohol, focusing more on wellness is growing. One of those things that could extend years, if not decades. I mean, just look at the rise of non-alcoholic beverages. Non-alcoholic beer, wine, and liquor jumped 32% from 2023 over 2022, while total alcohol sales were essentially flat.
And then if you look at what Whole Foods is selling, which is maybe one of our trendier supermarkets, the top-selling beer there as of earlier this year was non-alcoholic, was Athletic Brewing.
Right. I do want to drill into the marijuana portion, though, too, because when we did that Toby's Friends all the way back in January, we were like, oh, wow, the amount of teenagers that are smoking weed versus, you know, drinking alcohol is a lot higher. Not teenagers, but 18 to 25 age group was a lot higher over the past year.
But then recently there's been a little bit of a stop in the legalized weed movement on the state level because Florida voted low on know to legalize weed this year. So maybe the weed industry will run into a little bit more headwinds than we're expecting.
But I am curious to see if that Google trend data starts to go up again as we move into this next iteration of dry January and we just do this whole trend all over again.
It'll be we I'm sure we will in a few weeks. And it'll be curious to see what the next Trump administration, how it's going to deal with weed. We know that the Biden administration moved to classify it as a much less harmful substance than it is now. And the wildcard here could be RFK Jr. is going to be the Health and Human Services Secretary. He is very pro-cannabis.
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Chapter 3: What caused the rise of romantic novels this year?
I think it's only going to get even bigger because this was really the year that book talk exploded. I mean, I don't know if this was the first year it happened, but it really 20 million romance novels being sold compared to those other like A-list authors. It truly is the book industry at this point. So I think it's only going to snowball from here.
Now let's head to the fashion world where nostalgia was the trend du jour. One brand I want to highlight again is Asics. Asics is a 75-year-old Japanese running shoe company, but its stock price has quadrupled over the past two years as it's ridden this wave of popularity in both running and fashion circles.
First, it capitalized on the pandemic running boom quite well, but it's also seeing success on the backs of its ugly dad sneakers. Some of its more classic silhouettes, like the Gel Kayano, have become fashionable as the quote-unquote ugly shoe wave continues to rip. As Nike has stumbled this year, Neil, Asics has done very well, and part of that is this return towards nostalgic silhouettes.
Yeah, I think nostalgia is very powerful in marketing, and it's always been around. I think brands are getting very good at it, especially in 2024. It just makes you feel better about It makes you think about the past, and often when you think about the past, you feel like it was better times than it is now.
I think ASICS is one brand that has done a great job of capitalizing on this, and especially in the resale market. On StockX in 2024, trades of ASICS products were up 1,000% year over year. So to say this is a spike is an understatement.
I mean, just walking around New York City, you can see it happening in front of your eyes. I mean, I go to the gym. I look people in the eye, Toby. I don't look at their face. I go straight to the sneakers. What's ironic about this trend, though, this return to nostalgia, is that Nike, its stock had a very bad year, down about 25% as the time that we are recording this.
Part of the reason that it had such a bad year is that it relied too heavily on its fans. nostalgic silhouettes like the Nike Dunks, like Jordan, and it didn't innovate enough. So it is one of those things where you can get too far sucked down the nostalgia rabbit hole. But I will say Asics isn't all nostalgia. It also has this very forward-looking running shoe division.
Their running products are as comparable, if not better, than anyone else in the game right now. So I do think it is navigating the tightrope of let's remember our heritage, but also let's look forward into the future with our running tech as well. But on this topic of nostalgia, another fun trend in fashion was the emergence of the mob wife aesthetic.
This was mostly a TikTok thing that involved serving up looks that have big fur coats, lots of leather animal prints that don't really match, big hair, and, of course, stacks of gold jewelry. Just think Sopranos because that's pretty much exactly what it was inspired by. This year was the 25th anniversary of the show. And even though this wasn't one of the longer trends of the year—
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Chapter 4: How did nostalgia influence fashion trends in 2024?
And when we spoke about this trend earlier this year, what we said was that downtowns love resale stores because brick and mortar is still just their bread and butter. Brick and mortar is their bread and butter because, yes, you can go on RealReal. Yes, you can go on Depop.
But nothing recreates the experience of going into a vintage store, trying all the things because they're all idiosyncratic things. You don't know how things are going to fit. So they've been propping up some downtowns because they are really one of the only tenants that still need brick and mortar retail space.
Yeah. I mean, do you think nostalgia is unique to 2024 or has it always been here and we're just talking about because we're podcasters now?
It could be that we're podcasters now and it's not like vintage really popped up, but fashion is cyclical. I think that's the biggest takeaway from this entire category is that maybe vintage will start calming down again. We will be looking forward to new styles going forward, but
Maybe it's because we got a mic in front of us, but I do think that there is something here, specifically in 2024, in the air that people wanted to look back in history. Okay, final note on fashion trends. Remember the sock war between millennials and Gen Z? Oh, yeah. I'm going to put you on the spot.
Do you remember which type of sock Gen Z prefers and which sock millennials prefer? I do because I'm very self-conscious about it now. I feel like millennials got teased by Gen Z for wearing the ankle socks instead of the ones that go up a little more on your calf. So you won't catch me wearing ankle socks ever again.
See, you do look at people's ankles, Neil, because you started— I look at mine. You look at your own ankles. Yeah, I— realize that I, cause I'm right on the cusp of Gen Z and millennial. And I kind of realized I wear mid level socks. Like they are not exactly ankle socks. They're not the no show socks, but they're also not like the high, you know, tube socks.
So I think that perfectly encapsulates where I sit, which is straddling generations. We're going to take a quick break, but more Toby's trends coming up next. Okay, another macro trend I want to talk about is loneliness. Starting with eating alone. In the U.S., solo dining reservations are up nearly 30% over the last two years, according to OpenTable.
And a survey of 2,000 diners found that 60% of Gen Z and millennial respondents have dined solo dolo at least once in the past year. You know, dining alone went from being something that was almost scoffed at and used as a punchline in a lot of movies to now being totally normal.
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Chapter 5: What is the significance of the mob wife aesthetic?
I think a big part of it too is the rise of fast casual chains. Kava, Sweetgreen, Chipotle. These are places where it's very normal to go at lunchtime, grab a bowl, sit and eat by yourself. I mean, I do that all the time because it is just a brief respite in your busy day. So
I think you can go as deep into it like maybe people are lonely or maybe people are just being more convenient and really engaging with these fast casual chains. But another, also on this topic of loneliness, that was another trend we did where we covered America turning into a nation of homebodies.
Even coming out of the pandemic, census data shows that Americans are spending more time at home than ever before. The American Time Use Survey showed that time spent at home increased by an hour and 39 minutes a day from 2003 to 2022.
Obviously, a rise in work from home contributed to those numbers, but also things like education, eating and drinking, and religious activities have moved into the house. Largest shift actually did come from religious activities. 59% occurred at home in 2022, up from just 24% in 2003. So we really did move a lot of our lives indoors.
Yeah. And in response to that, there's been this phrase that has become way more popular, which is go touch some grass. And I think that is has been another trend of 2024 that we didn't talk about, where there's an urge from people online who to others who are spending all their time online. So maybe people in glass houses.
But certainly people are telling are saying, go touch some grass, you know, be a part of the real world. especially when it came to this electoral season where a lot of discussions were happening online that may not have mirrored what was happening in the actual real world. So that reminds me of just saying, you know, go touch some grass sometimes. Got to get outside.
Put on your ankle socks and go outside. But another trend that this also reminded me of that I think we did was about the rise of huge televisions. Oh. Which was the fact that there was a tenfold increase in massive televisions of at least 97 inches or bigger this year over last year through the first nine months of the year.
So if people are spending more time at home, which they are, they're doing it up.
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Chapter 6: How is vintage shopping evolving in today’s market?
Make this face look good. Again, this is another trend that it reminded me of. A trend within a trend of moving things into home was fridge scaping. Remember, people started decorating their refrigerators in these aesthetic ways and then posting them on Instagram.
Think colored Tupperware tops, label-free mason jars, even some non-edible elements like flowers would bring themes out like they were dressing them up as The Hobbit or Bridgerton. So that was certainly born of spending more time in the house as well.
Yeah, that one doesn't have a long shelf life.
I see what you did there. People were actually mad about this, though, because they're saying like taking dairy products out of their sealed containers and putting them into different containers like messes up the pasteurization. So that one was probably valuing aesthetics over, you know, actual practicality there. But that was a big trend of moving more life indoors.
One business idea that emerged out of this rise in loneliness, too, is the emergence of AI products being built to address loneliness. We talked about one company, Friend.com, who is designing this wearable pendant that listens to you throughout the day and is always there to just chat.
It's meant to keep you company, not make you more productive, because we are seeing tons of Google search interest already in AI girlfriends and AI boyfriends. People are more isolated than ever, so having someone to talk to that understands you because it's been listening, there's probably a big market out there for a device like this and others.
Absolutely. I mean, we're just over two years into the quote unquote AI revolution launched by ChatGPT in November 2022. And it's clear, you know, one of the biggest use cases for AI is being your friend or having a companion, which was predicted really by the movie Her and also, you know, AI boyfriends, girlfriends.
There was this study that came out that analyzed a million chat GPT interactions, found that the second most popular use was sexual role playing. So clearly people are using AI for intimacy. And also just to converse with bots, one of these companies is Character.ai. It's one of the biggest AI companies out there. Last year it raised $150 million. It is an absolute behemoth company.
So if you're looking at, you know, if you're asking questions of like, okay, two years in to ChatGPT, what are people actually using it for? This companionship one is definitely one of the biggest.
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Chapter 7: What are the generational differences in sock preferences?
one, their daughter write a letter to her favorite athlete and he was using like Gemini AI to enable that. So there was this big clash between like human emotion and AI tools as well as like that actual, the Coca-Cola ad was a more recent thing where it looked like the uncanny valley because it was generated using AI. So I think you're definitely right. That is a trend we'll look at going forward.
And another one.
I don't know if this is a trend, but it's certainly in the cultural sphere, and I don't know if I have any deep analysis of it, but certainly the rise of the three pop stars, Chapel Roan, Sabrina Carpenter, and Charli XCX over the summer, especially Brat Summer, was a big trend, at least on social media, which is where you pick a lot of your trends from, kind of dethroning the music trend
royalty of 2023, which was Beyonce and Taylor Swift. So those three pop stars were absolutely, you know, they were everywhere this summer.
And again, I don't know what it means in the broader scope of things, but it shows that people are always looking, as much as they like nostalgia, they are looking for fresh, new, innovative ideas, which I think all those three, those three did, except, you know, a lot of them did borrow from nostalgia and make it their own Charlie XCX borrows a lot from dance club beats from decades ago.
Sabrina Carpenter channels the 70s in her music. So that mixing of old themes and music and putting a new spin on it was absolutely big in the cultural sphere.
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Chapter 8: Why is solo dining becoming more popular?
What's fascinating, too, about that is that Sabrina Carpenter and Charlie XCX had been around for a long time. They dropped multiple albums, but this year, for whatever reason, I think it could have been the nostalgia. Like, you might have just explained it very well there that people like that it evoked a time in the past. And then, I don't know, Chapel Rowan's just, like, incredible.
So, like, of course... She was just going to do well no matter what. But yeah, that's a good one. I think that maybe we'll get a new crop next year and we'll be talking about a new crop of pop stars in 2025.
The final trend that I just liked that I couldn't fit into any bigger, wider explanation was, remember raw dogging flights where people, mostly guys, would just go on seven-hour, eight-hour, nine-hour flights and just look at the seat in front of them or look at the flight map in front of them That didn't speak to anything, but I just remember that was very fun.
I thought about trying it on a recent long flight I had. I made it like 10 minutes.
Did you actually try? I did try. Were you going in with the intent like, I'm not going to do anything?
Well, I didn't fully commit myself to it, but I tried. And then what started happening, I was sitting next to the bathroom. People kept going by me, kept... Breaking my conversation, I got tired. So I don't know if people were just lying about that on social media, but it definitely was a thing that guys were like, let's just work on this. We're going to go inwards in our thoughts.
So not really speaks to anything bigger, but that was one of my feelings.
Are you allowed, if I had a window seat, could I look out the window?
I don't think so. I think you've got to shut it.
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