Young people in much of the developed, English-speaking world are on the brink of a kind of catharsis as the world starts to feel safe after the year and a bit indoors. And for those who have spent the past year alone or in unsatisfying relationships, this is being pitched as the Hot Vax Summer. The idea of getting vaxed, waxed and raring to go has become highly meme-able as people get excited about summer’s possibilities.
Media headlines have touted:
NYC singles ready for ‘slutty summer’ of casual sex as COVID-19 vaccinations rise
'Hot vax summer' is coming, and it's set to be a blissful release of pent-up horniness
I Found My ‘Hot Vax Summer’ Outfit
Do You Really Want to Break Up, or Are You Just Horny for Post-Vax Summer?
And whether you personally are likely to be going through a ho phase or a no phase over the next few months, it’s hard not to think there might be something to the trend when you see viral tweets like this one:
But when you start to unpick the data, while there’s a real desire for catharsis, there are a number of counter-currents that mean that the roaring twenties might not scream as loudly as the headlines might be hoping.
Logistics
Many young people have moved back into their parents’ homes through the pandemic, with 52% of US 18-29 year olds living with their parent(s) in July last year. This is the highest level since the Great Depression. Living at home with mum and dad is a bit of a damp squib when it comes to one night stands, and even the most chill boomer parents are likely to have something to say if their boomerang children are using their childhood bedrooms as a revolving door for nocturnal visitors.
For those wanting to really get into it, there’s always Airbnb. But the company has put in limits preventing people from booking accomodation at the last minute or only for one night, particularly over the Fourth of July weekend.
Consent & Safety
In both the UK and Australia there has been a general reckoning in recent months as women have been protesting the rape of a woman in Australia’s Parliament House, and the murder of Sarah Everard in the UK. These two events have been watershed moments as women have begun to loudly stand up to the underlying fear has that existed as part of our everyday existence.
Women’s safety has never been more front of mind, and the kind of events that might have been classed a “bad night out” in the early noughts of my youth are now being vocally addressed and reckoned with (thanks Gen Z). Now this is an incredibly complex topic (that I won’t do justice to in this issue) but is rooted in many of the mega narratives we’ve been fed since childhood - the idea that in heterosexual relationships men pursue and women demur. We’re in the messy middle of this as those ideas are challenged, new norms starting to emerge around enthusiastic consent (a very good thing!). This is being communicated with varying degrees of success (big fail from the Australian government), but more success from others (can’t embed, but this is really worth a view).
Emotional connection
Buried in many of the hot vax summer pieces has been a Kinsey survey that actually finds that interest in the one-night-stand is waning, with the demographically representative survey of 2,000 Americans conducted in partnership with Esquire and Cosmo finding that more than half say they’re just not into it anymore, and 64% say they’re less interested in having more than one partner at a time. 52% of people in that study say they are looking for a committed relationship next. These findings have played out in other studies, with a Match survey of 5,000 Americans finding that 58% of single app daters have shifted toward more intentional dating in the wake of the pandemic. 53% of these singles are now prioritising their search for a relationship. 52% have changed the qualities they look for in a potential partner and 44% say they had more meaningful conversations with a date in the last month (with Gen Z leading the pack at 50%).
Sex tech
According to this Business Insider article, VCs are noticing the sex tech revolution that’s taking place. This is a shift that was bubbling up before the pandemic (and something I predicted back in 2018/19), with female sexual pleasure becoming prioritised increasingly with brands like Dame, Maude, Nécessaire and Dipsea tapping the sweet spot for the aspirational pleasure-orientated D2C consumer. This accelerated at the start of the pandemic, with retailers running out of stock on many key items. As the consent conversation continues to move forward, so too are expectations that heterosexual women will have as much fun as lesbians and men of all sexual orientations (the stats on this are really something). But it’s not just those with vaginas that these startups are targeting, with brands like Cake, which sells a line of coconut butter moisturising cream for men, also garnering significant attention and funding. Outside of the pleasure play, other businesses in the sexual wellness space are emerging, with new companies offering subscription birth control and monthly STI testing.
Social exhaustion
For many, returning to crowded spaces and interacting with other people after this extended period alone is exhausting. Zoom conversations don’t tend to involve us sitting in silence, with calls tending to be task orientated, limited in length and one person speaking at a time. Going into public spaces for extended periods is likely, for many, to create sensory overload, even if it is something that people have been positively anticipating returning to. Expect some pretty awkward banter, something that is not conducive to hook-up culture. There are other things that people will need to figure their way through beyond social jet-lag, things like alcohol and drug tolerance. With some hard seltzer brands launching higher alcohol versions, this will become even more important, particularly as people drink faster to offset their social awkwardness.
Search data
When you look at google searches for the phrases “Slutty Summer” and “Hot Vax Summer” you get search spikes around the time that the articles came out, but searches on this topic have not had a long tail. When I instead compare against the terms “horny” and “lonely”, you’ll see that it’s not having a huge impact, and it’s largely limited to locations on either coast of the US (and no significant search results in other markets).
New routes to connection
The truth is that the hot vax summer fantasy of sweaty bodies writhing on a dance floor, sucking face with a random stranger that you’ve just met is unlikely to come to fruition. With bars largely opening under social distancing regulations, and groups being kept separate, the likelihood of finding someone you want to make out with on the dance floor is pretty limited. The meet-cute phase is increasingly taking place online and via video - with the Match survey finding that 70% of the people who used video chatting during the pandemic as a way of first interacting with people intend to keep doing it as the pandemic abates.
If not this, then what?
For brands looking to connect with the reality of people’s lives should be focusing on connection over copulation. While the slutty summer story is a fun diversion and creates a sense of escapism (and an alternative narrative to actually dealing with the collective compound trauma created over the past year), it is unlikely to resonate with the emotional truth of people’s lives.
As consumers in those developed markets start to return to the world again, it’s really important to remember that people are coming out at the pace of feelings rather than facts. In Australia, where things have been relatively stable for some time, people have been quick to return to restaurants (to see friends) and shopping centres, but many are still actively avoiding clubs, gyms and live music venues.
With an increased focus on women’s safety, particularly as people start testing their limits around alcohol again, the focus needs to be back on safety (and not just from a Covid-19 perspective).
Navigating this messy middle, the idea of what constitutes a hot girl/boy summer is changing, from girls dressing up in order to capture the attention of a person of interest, to being about dressing up, and having a great time with friends. The idea of dressing sensuously for the male gaze is changing with a key indicator of this shift Billie Eilish’s comments about her cover for British Vogue.
“i love these pictures and i loved doing this shoot. do whatever you want whenever you want. fuck everything else.”
The other thing to remember is just because an idea seems true, doesn’t make it so. In my 15 years of working as a journalist and futurist/ trend forecaster, there’s a tendency for industry people to predict the outcomes they want (see Revenge Spending) in the hope they speak these things into reality.
If you made it this far - thanks for reading (and I the topic didn’t mean this fell into your spam folder). I’d love to hear your feedback and what you want to hear about next - petah@petahmarian.com.