There Is a Potential Collector in Every Consumer

William H. Ryan, Ellen R. K. Evers and Siegwart M. Lindenberg

Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, 2025, vol. 10, issue 4, 433 - 446

Abstract: Collecting is a unique consumption behavior. Unlike other items’ consumption, where consumers buy a good to satisfy some higher need, collectors acquire products merely to have the item in their possession. Past studies have primarily been qualitative studies employing convenience samples of “extreme” collectors. We investigate the characteristics and motivations of collectors in a representative nation-wide sample (N=5,069) across two waves 10 years apart, while leveraging dozens of other surveys administered to the panel to test a wide range of hypotheses regarding collections. We find that while a third of consumers collect, very few who do so identify strongly as collectors. Those who identify strongly as collectors are significantly different from most collectors, implying that research focusing only on those who strongly identify as collectors will lead to conclusions which do not provide insights in collecting in general. Solutions to the problems documented are discussed in the general discussion.

Date: 2025
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