The Market for Organization Equals USD 7.6B

| Chihmao Hsieh |

Home organization (in 2009), that is.

A CNN article posted online last month has re-appeared in the headlines today, probably in response to the woman who is virtually selling virtually (sic) all her belongings in one single auction on EBay (see the actual listing here). To spare you the reading, the article essentially describes our “hyper-consumptive society deluged by its own belongings,” mentions the TV shows and firms that create products and promote services to help us organize our belongings, and highlights associations like the new-but-fast-growing National Association of Professional Organizers.

Personally, in the last few years I’ve become much more mindful of the number of discrete items I keep at home, that mindfulness mainly a side effect of thinking in terms of this kind of complexity theory and this subfield of cognitive science.

3 Comments Add your own

1. Peter Klein | 26 April 2007 at 10:17 pm

That gives me an idea for a new sister site on the marketing of professional organizer services, “Organizers and Markets.” I believe the domain organizersandmarkets.com is available.

Even better, how about organizingmeerkats.com? Someone has already done some background work:

http://www.bio.davidson.edu/people/vecase/Behavior/Spring2004/fitzpatrick/Basic%20Social%20Organization.htm
2. JC | 30 April 2007 at 10:33 pm

I commend an article in today’s (4/30) New York Times about Zebo http://www.zebo.com/ MyThings and iTaggit. These sites help you itemize, value and sell every item you own – or perhaps more to the point, let you claim bragging rights based on your property as displayed. Here is a new manifestation of the link between possessions and social identity. In cyberspace there is nothing to be gained by parking the new car in the drive – we need to get the news out there!
3. Bruce’s Blog / links for 2007-05-11 | 10 May 2007 at 7:29 pm

[…] The Market for Organization Equals USD 7.6B « Organizations and Markets A CNN article posted online last month has re-appeared in the headlines today, probably in response to the woman who is virtually selling virtually (sic) all her belongings in one single auction on EBay (see the actual listing here). To spare you the read (tags: consumption consumers marketing sales auctions) […]