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“Huge back-to-school haul,” declared TikTok creator Kaylee Jolley to her 122,000 followers last month, holding up multiple shopping bags. The eight-minute video, during which she goes through each purchase, has garnered 1.8 million likes and 12.9 million views. Other creators, like Page Trepanier, have drawn similar engagement. Back-to-school — already a key selling period for many brands targeting younger shoppers — is going into overdrive in the TikTok era.
It is a natural evolution for shopping hauls (where creators show off purchases or gifts), which have taken off over the past two years. But the rise of back-to-school content is notably sharp: 13,000 videos using the hashtag #backtoschoolhaul have been posted over the past week, up 47 per cent on this time last year, according to data analyst and Style Analytics founder Molly Rooyakkers.
What’s caught the zeitgeist? “Back-to-school time has a ‘new beginning’ energy to it, and with many Gen Z going through key transitions in school, it feels like a ripe time to experiment with their identity via their skincare routines, style and beauty looks,” says Rachel Lee, global insights strategist at creative agency The Digital Fairy.
TikTok content
More than half (55 per cent) of students in the US had already begun purchasing school supplies by the start of July, according to the National Retail Federation. It forecasts that $86.6 billion will be spent on college essentials this year.
Brands that successfully place themselves into these videos hope to court a large share of this market. Longchamp, Marc Jacobs, Aritzia, H&M, Garage, Abercrombie Fitch and Hollister have been the most commonly featured brands in #backtoschoolhaul content, Rooyakkers says. And they have been quick to capitalise with shop edits online of viral products and additional influencer seeding.
Cashing in on the craze
Urban Outfitters has increased spending on influencers by 50 per cent this year compared to last, reflecting the growing power of creators and haul videos in driving sales. “Our social teams are focused on engagement rather than publishing [content],” says Dmitri Siegel, chief creative brand and digital officer at Urban Outfitters, noting that the team are constantly surveying the app for trends to participate in, such as back-to-school. “It allows us to adapt and be part of the online conversation, versus interrupting it with marketing,” Siegel explains.
In the lead-up to back-to-school season, Urban Outfitters launched a three-phased campaign, ‘Shift Happens’, which was anchored around mental health and self-expression. It included IRL experiences such as a Live On Campus concert series at its college-adjacent stores across the US; throughout the campaign, the brand has been working with creators to amplify these experiences on TikTok. As a result, many products showcased during the activations have subsequently ended up in haul content. “We focused on creating high-impact, real-life experiences around these insights that drive online content and engagement,” explains Siegel.
Ugg has also found success in back-to-school hauls. “The back-to-school time frame coincides with our global preparation for ‘Ugg season’,” says company president Anne Spangenberg. To prepare, the brand ensures it has access to key styles that are historically out of stock ahead of this peak period, like the viral Tazz slip-on in the colour mustard seed, which restocked in July. “To help spread the word, we partnered with Erewhon on a limited-edition drink and tapped influencer friends to create content around the announcement,” Spangenberg says. Evidently, the silhouette popped up in multiple haul videos.
TikTok is not the only source of discovery for Gen Z. Users are also taking to Pinterest to research “dorm room decor, freshers’ week outfits and beauty looks”, says Jessica Payne, head of fashion at Pinterest UK. Searches for “university outfits” and “back-to-school nails” are on the rise (up 70 per cent and 50 per cent year-on-year in August, respectively).
TikTok content
The platform has been working with brands to help bolster their back-to-school standing. For example, it collaborated with Pacsun for a takeover of its top 150 bricks-and-mortar store windows at the start of August, creating interactive displays that emulated large Pinterest boards and featured a QR code for people to then shop the boards with Pacsun. Pinterest also shared that baggy jeans have been trending heavily (once again) on the platform, as students prepare for college. Pacsun’s resulting ‘Better in Baggy’ back-to-school campaign paid off, featuring in numerous back-to-school haul videos.
The perils of over indexing on haul content
It’s long been claimed that Gen Z is more environmentally conscious than preceding generations. So why is haul content, notorious for encouraging the overconsumption of fast fashion brands, still so alluring?
For Rooyakkers, the pressure to follow trends and the focus on self-optimisation from a young age can lead to actions that clash with Gen Z’s environmental values. “This contradiction highlights the fact that Gen Z and Gen Alpha cannot be reduced to a single statistic or behaviour,” she says.
It’s a sentiment that The Digital Fairy’s Lee echoes: “As much as we see younger generations choosing to only shop secondhand, we are also seeing many buy into fast fashion, perpetuated by companies like Shein and Temu. It’s a myth that this generation is the most environmentally conscious, because their behaviour is a lot more nuanced than sustainable versus unsustainable.”
Still, Lee warns that brands must tread carefully. ‘Underconsumption core’, which encourages people to not buy into trends and “actually use something until it’s worn out or broken”, is also trending on social media, she says. “This is not to say that haul culture is going away,” continues Lee, but that this “dynamic is a constant pendulum swing; one influenced by trends, budgets and life stages”.
That’s why, as much as brands have been capitalising on the back-to-school haul craze, some have been careful to promote a year-long attitude towards any purchases so as not to alienate potential consumer shifts. “Because we’re one of the only retailers physically on or adjacent to campuses, we’re not just there for their back-to-school season. We’ll be there for all their important milestones from their first game day to homecoming to winter break, graduation and beyond,” says Urban Outfitters’s Siegel.
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