Brick-and-Platform: Listing Labor in the Digital Vintage Economy

Abstract

<jats:p> Vintage goods are valued for their nostalgic association with pre-digital modes of production, but their contemporary trafficking is increasingly organized by processes of platformization. The central component of what we call “listing labor in the digital vintage economy” is the online display of collectible merchandise, but listing labor also entails promoting sellers’ brands on social media and using sales platforms and other logistical media to manage inventory, process transactions, and handle shipments. Listing labor is performed by branded merchants and their employees alongside independent entrepreneurs. The digital vintage economy connects brick-and-mortar shops and resale supply chains organized around flea markets, thrift shops and charity bins, estate sales, and consigners, to online clearinghouses like eBay and Craigslist, and to social media and payment apps. In this article, we argue that listing labor in the digital vintage economy further develops the concept of “platform labor.” We focus on vintage clothes and vinyl records, dominated by women and men, respectively, to help us analyze divisions of listing labor organized by gender, race, age, and class. We draw upon 20 semi-structured interviews with shop owners and employees and on participant observation in independently owned clothing boutiques and record stores in several US cities. The digital vintage economy provides another angle for understanding how identity-based distinctions affect the opportunities associated with platform labor, and our account of listing labor highlights the need for studies of platformization that analyze its effects on specific local economies as well as on job markets and commercial sectors. </jats:p>

Platform Specificities: The Platform Books Panel

“…In such cases, these developments can be seen as giving people a means for adapting their paid work to a COVID context, remediated on Instagram; however, they also highlight the challenges for many in either learning how to effectively use platforms in a time of hardship, and in developing new skills and carrying out more labour without any guaranteed payoff (see Kneese & Palm, 2020). The pandemic context then complicates questions of who benefits from templatability, and of mechanisms for resisting and challenging it.…”

Selling in place: the home as virtual storefront

“…But for many independent sellers, e-commerce platforms like Etsy and Shopify, payment service providers (PSPs) like Square and PayPal, and social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram were already fundamental to their businesses. Based on our long-term ethnographic research in cities like Oakland, San Francisco, Chicago, Portland, Philadelphia, and Brooklyn, we define the "digital vintage economy" as an umbrella category for the online trafficking of collectibles like books, clothes, comics, furniture, records, and toys, including new "handmade" or artisanal merchandise sold by small, independent businesses (Kneese & Palm, 2020). While our work is based in the US, we have also attempted to emphasize the globalized nature of the digital vintage economy, in which small local shops interface with global audiences through a constellation of social media platforms, PSPs, and e-commerce sites.…”

“…Within the context of the digital vintage economy, platform labor, and algorithmically organized, recommendation-based content providers is changing the nature of selling online. What we refer to as "listing labor" entails animating online inventory with an aura of authenticity, through lively descriptions and photos (Kneese and Palm, 2020), which also means regularly producing engaging content and keeping potential customers invested through posts. Both objects for sale and shop personnel must project a feeling of authenticity, employing influencer-like tactics of social media broadcasting and personal branding to appeal to buyers.…”

Keep it Oakland: e-commerce meets social justice

“…Instead, they may be good at selecting items to sell, physically curating a shop, chatting with customers, and maintaining social relationships within a community setting. The skills needed to maintain an online store are not necessarily the same as the ones that keep a brick-and-mortar business alive (Kneese & Palm, 2020).…”

“…Cultural workers have long been precarious and have become increasingly dependent upon commercial platforms. Small retailers with brick-and-mortar locations use social media along with commercial platforms to attract and retain customers, balancing personal posts with enticing images of new merchandise (Kneese & Palm, 2020). As I have found through my interviews with shop workers, shifting sales online encompasses new forms of labor, as staff must message with customers and inform them of the condition of items, their price, or other details, and receive payment and shipping information through payment processors.…”