I Can’t Stop Thinking About “Buy Now – The Shopping Conspiracy” on Netflix. This Is Why –

I watched the ‘Buy Now – The Shopping Conspiracy’ documentary on Netflix last night…and I must admit that there were parts that left me feeling physically ill. The film exposes – and confronts – what we all know but won’t admit: that we’re trapped in an insidious, meticulously designed, and very vicious cycle of overconsumption.

The film features many industry insiders and ex-employees who basically treat the production like a public therapy session and unload all their guilt on camera. We hear confessions like “I didn’t think about the consequences” and “You’re being played“, along with a creepy Siri-like presence called “Sasha”, that gives gyaan about how you make profits when you sell more, waste more and control more.

The documentary’s big goal seems to be making terms like planned obsolescence and greenwashing subjects of dinner-table conversations – like how your old iPhone mysteriously gives up right when a new one drops, or H&M slapping a “sustainable” label on its clothes while shipping truckloads of unsold fast fashion to landfills in Africa.

But what really stuck with me were two uncomfortable truths:

We have no idea we’re overconsuming

Every day, we scroll through a relentless stream of influencers unboxing package after package, like it’s their full-time job to swim in bubble wrap. (And honestly, it is.) Hauls have become a whole genre on YouTube. And brands? They’re doubling down, desperate to scream louder than the competition. Packaging isn’t just obnoxious anymore; it’s theater. Case in point: a beauty creator recently unboxed a PR kit containing 120 foundations. If she finds her match in three, what happens to the other 117? Landfill? Giveaway? Who cares—it’s already waste.

It’s this absurd excess that has quietly become our new “normal.” Suddenly, our smaller shopping binges—those 10 identical white shirts—feel minimalist by comparison. Worse, we’re sold the fantasy that a wardrobe with 20 options for every occasion is aspirational, not suffocating.

Whether we’re full-blown participants or just enabling from the sidelines, overconsumption isn’t just normalized—it’s rewritten to sound like ambition. And the scariest part? We’ve stopped questioning it.

Overconsumption hurts women as much as it hurts the planet

The playbook for overconsumption, the documentary reveals, is from fashion. When women consume, there are plenty of social rewards – you’re told you’re stylish, fashionable, well-presented – and you’re automatically considered to be more valuable to society. This is a phenomenon that predates Amazon’s sneaky UX design. After all, Carrie Bradshaw’s shoe closet had never been an object of ridicule, but an object of desire.

In India, it is believed that 48% of urban e-Commerce shoppers are women¹. Also in India, women only own 20-30% of the country’s Rs. 73 lakh crore worth of household wealth². This is a very generous estimate in a country where ownership rarely translates to control. And finally, our contribution to the GDP is only 18% compared to men³.

Translation: We’re making far less money, barely owning any assets, but are consuming on par with men. We’re fed desire every single day – ads, influencers, sales, ‘must-haves’- but no one talks about how our financial lives are far more vulnerable. No one warns us about accumulating in the present at the cost of our future.

Make a difference – to yourself

The truth is that you and I staying away from Zara will have zero difference on greenhouse emissions. Corporate greed is the silver bullet to climate change, not our personal carbon footprints.

But what we can change is our financial future. These corporations are built on the revenue we feed them. Every time we forgo things we don’t need for a future we do want, we’re taking back control. Your future self will thank you. And maybe—just maybe—the planet will too.