It’s been another busy week for the consumer sector — one that captured the full spectrum of modern capitalism: from the sovereign rise of AI, to the cracks in luxury confidence, and the reinvention of everyday consumption.
I spent the week on the road across Europe — meeting clients, companies, and partners — and what stood out wasn’t what was said in boardrooms, but what was whispered over coffee or caught between meetings. Several friends now living abroad, drawn by friendlier tax regimes, echoed the same sentiment about the UK’s decline. “I don’t know how the UK turns it around,” one said. “It’s really sad.” It felt fitting that gold hit all-time highs that same day — a symbol of both anxiety and protection.
Against this backdrop, AI continues to evolve from an operational tool into an economic necessity. In conversations across sectors, enthusiasm for AI was universal — but often directed toward “someone else’s department.” That hesitation speaks volumes: businesses know AI is transformative, yet few have structured cross-functional strategies to truly embed it. The winners will be those that bridge those silos first.
AI Becomes Infrastructure, Not a Buzzword
This week’s OpenAI Developer Day 2025 crystallized that shift. What began as a chatbot is now morphing into an AI operating system — a platform layer capable of reconfiguring workflows across industries.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman speaking at the OpenAI DevDay on Monday
Sam Altman unveiled the “trillion-token club” — companies processing over one trillion AI tokens through OpenAI’s models. These aren’t startups experimenting in sandboxes. They’re public enterprises like Salesforce, Shopify, HubSpot, T-Mobile, Datadog, and Mercado Libre — embedding AI deep inside customer support, logistics, and marketing. PwC, with 100,000+ employees on ChatGPT Enterprise, is now OpenAI’s single largest client at over $50 million annually.
The key insight: AI is no longer a standalone product — it’s invisible infrastructure. It’s what electricity was to factories in 1900: a hidden productivity engine redefining cost curves and competitive barriers. For consumer investors, this means the advantage is shifting from brand differentiation to execution speed and data leverage. Shopify and Mercado Libre, for instance, are quietly turning AI into a margin lever that compounds daily.
(Watch our short video summary on OpenAI Dev Day for the full breakdown.)
Luxury Meets Its Limits
If OpenAI showcased boundless optimism, Ferrari’s Capital Markets Day reminded investors that even icons hit ceilings.
Ferrari — Italy’s strongest brand with a score of 90.1, ahead of Rolex and Chanel — suffered a historic 15% stock decline, its worst trading day ever. Despite €680 million in annual Formula 1 royalties and multi-year waitlists, Ferrari cut its 2030 targets and slashed EV ambitions from 40% to 20% of its lineup. The message was unmistakable: even ultra-wealthy consumers aren’t embracing electric luxury.
This matters beyond Maranello. Nearly 40% of luxury buyers are under 40, and 78% say sustainability matters, yet half cite charging times and range anxiety as dealbreakers for EVs. When a company trading at 50x earnings must temper growth due to consumer hesitation, it signals a broader inflection: the aspirational consumer has become pragmatic.
Luxury once sold dreams of performance and exclusivity. Now it must sell convenience and conscience. Ferrari’s retreat forces investors to revalue what “premium” really means in a world where luxury is no longer immune to technological friction.
The Snack Slowdown: Pepsi and the Price of Complacency
Meanwhile, in mass consumption, PepsiCo offered the mirror image of Ferrari’s dilemma: not too few buyers, but too few reasons to buy.
PepsiCo’s largest brands
The company beat earnings expectations, yet North American food volumes fell 4%, marking the 18th straight month of decline. Impulse snack sales dropped 17%, a staggering number for a brand that once owned America’s checkout aisles. Pepsi has shuttered facilities, trimmed 15% of its product portfolio, and resorted to sub-$2 price points to lure back consumers.
The root issue isn’t inflation fatigue. It’s behavioral evolution: GLP-1 drugs, hybrid work patterns, and wellness awareness are quietly reshaping consumption habits. Consumers still snack — 91% do daily — but they’re migrating to smaller, functional brands that feel authentic and healthy.
Activist investors have noticed. With Walmart’s CFO Steve Schmitt now stepping in as Pepsi’s new finance chief, expect sharper discipline — refranchising bottlers, rationalizing SKUs, and revisiting cost structures. The company trades near 2009-level valuations, despite 18 consecutive quarters of international growth. It’s a paradox emblematic of today’s consumer market: global success overshadowed by domestic disillusionment.
The week offered a glimpse of the next phase of the consumer economy: data-driven, value-conscious, and emotionally discerning. From AI-embedded commerce to recalibrated indulgence, one pattern persists — resilience now depends on reinvention.
At Infusive, we continue to seek companies that sit at that intersection: those who understand not only what people buy, but why they buy — and how that “why” evolves with every new technology, trend, and taste.
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What an exciting time to be alive!
Jack