Postmodernism is something that gets everywhere but no one can quite explain what it is. Variously described as ‘a con’, the kiss of death to any art form, high or low and the new perspective on life and the human condition that is sweeping across the globe, postmodernism has generated an enormous amount of academic and lay discussion in recent years. It is regularly profiled in Quality newspapers and magazines; it has entered popular parlance as a fashionable euphemism for subversive, ironic or chaotic: it has affected almost every arena of cultural and artistic endeavor (music, film, fashion, drama, dance. architecture, literature, television etc.); and it has infiltrated the A to Z of academic disciplines, albeit with varying degrees of success.

Postmodernism has been defined in a host of different ways ranging from the humorous to the incomprehensible. How¬ever, a moment’s reflection on the term ‘postmodernism’, or any of the associated family of terms (postmodern, postmodemity, postmodemization. postmodernist etc.) reveals that they are ostensibly meaningless. If ‘modem’ is that which is current, up-to-date or progressive, and ‘post’ is that which lies beyond, comes after or exceeds, how is it possible, outside perhaps of the pages of science fiction, to be beyond the present, to be later than the latest, to exceed the extant – to be postmodern? And, accepting for a moment the existence of this incongruous futuristic milieu, the question has to be asked, does the prefix ‘post1 mean that we have broken with the present — in either a positive (freedom, renewal, innovation) or negative (diminution, decay, entropy) sense – or are we an ached by an umbilicus, and if so, what is the precise nature of connection?

Faced with these unanswerable questions, many marketers might be tempted to dismiss the whole postmodern project as an unnecessary distrac¬tion, a passing intellectual fad. While such sentiments are understandable, they overlook two important facts. First, marketing and postmodernism are already lightly interwoven. On reading the copious postmodern literature, almost irrespective of discipline or source, one is struck not only by the sheer prevalence of marketing artefacts and institutions – shopping centers, department stores, advertising campaigns, package designs, new product development and the entire consumption experience — but also by the sheer originality and often dazzling acuity of these ‘extra-marketing’ marketing analyses. Second, just as postmodernism has often been described as a crisis of representation, where the old theoretical, epistemological and ontological certitudes of rationality, truth and progress have been challenged, subverted and replaced with, well, a refusal to act as replacement, so too many commentators on the current marketing scene contend that our discipline is in the throes of a very serious intellectual crisis). True, people have been declaring that marketing is in crisis from time immemorial and not everyone concurs with the crisis-mongers’ diagnosis of marketing’s present state of health, but it is undeniable that a great many leading authorities maintain that marketing is facing a ‘mid-life crisis’, a fundamental crisis of representation.

Given the apparent interpenetration of marketing and postmodernism, this chapter will seek to explore the nature of the relationship between the two. It commences with an overview of (he postmodern condition, turns to an analysis of postmodern marketing practices, continues with a discussion of postmodern marketing concepts, culminates in a deconstruction of the celebrated ‘realism versus relativism’ debate, and concludes with an attempt to answer the simple but all-important question: is postmodernism the end of marketing?

As marketing, in many respects, reflects developments in the social, economic and cultural spheres generally, it is only to be expected that the characteristic features of postmodernism are apparent – and deeply inscribed – in today’s marketing environment. Indeed, if it were not such a blatantly modernist approach to the subject, it would be possible to imagine a matrix with the distinguishing features of postmodernism along one axis and the elements of the marketing mix along the other. Such an exercise, of course, is doomed to inevitable failure, as it is totally contrary to the cavalier, insouciant and genre-busting spirit of postmodernism. Nonetheless, it is undeniable that all of the distinguishing features of postmodernism are discernible on the current marketing scene and discernible, moreover, across every facet of marketing from pricing to promotions.

Thus, for example, the fragmentation of markets into smaller and smaller segments, each with its complement of carefully positioned products, is everywhere apparent. Whether it be the market for computers, coffee, cola, cameras, cigarettes, breakfast cereals, ice cream, financial services, sports shoes, package holidays, pet foods, disposable nappies, washing powder, recorded music, mineral water, traction batteries, machine tools or the gamut of health and beauty aids, a bewildering array of product and service offers typically obtains. Ten years ago, there were seven brands of toothpaste on sale in the UK. Today, there are more than 30, many of which provide a number of distinct product variations (tartar control, pump action dispensers and so on). In the USA, there are now 240 Weight Watchers products spread across 78 different categories; the number of lagers on sale in Britain has increased by 66 per cent in the last six years; and such is the prevailing range of credit cards and payment systems that the days of hard cash, personal cheques or, in extremis, Access/Barelaycard seem like a dim and distant memory. Indeed, in the new car market it appears that you can now have any color, engine size, bodywork variant, trim level, sound system, safety features, optional extras and license plate you like, as long as you’re in the black.

This seemingly inexorable process of fragmentation is counterpointed to some extent by a clearly discernible trend towards differentiation, the blurring of what were once clear-cut marketing boundaries (infomercials, advertorials, edutainment, retail warehouses, factory outlets, interactive advertising, manufacturer brands and own label, etc.). From a marketing management perspective, perhaps the most important instances of differentiation emanate from the recent and much vaunted rise of strategic alliances, joint ventures, collaborative networks and boundaryless corporations…

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