Why don't manufacturers listen?

Because manufacturers make what sells. Either these are the products the majority of non-pea scrappers want or enough people aren't complaining/asking for a change. Because the peas aren't the be-all end-all of scrapbooking. And not even all the peas are in agreement as to products. Most peas hate pink while I love it,it's my favourite colour. I enjoy themed lines, I can purchase an entire line that fits my album knowing everything is coordinated. I don't have to spend hours shopping hoping colours match wondering if I'll find that just right diecut etc.

I think too that in some cases there just aren't enough people to whom something would apply to make it cost effective. For example, a friend of mine would like a line for unusual pets specifically sugar gliders. How many people own sugar gliders and scrapbook about them?

I don't know. It is nice when companies listen. Positive changes are always welcome. I just don't think us peas are the typical scrapbooker.lol

I'm curious to see what others think of this topic, thanks for posting.😊

Perhaps this is one reason why getting artsy and making your own backgrounds with various artistic techniques is so popular. We all have photos that we’ll never (or rarely) find paper and embellishment lines that are what we need.

I’ve been scrapbooking for about 25 years. During that time, I have had numerous photos for which there were no appropriate papers or embellishments. Or if there were, they were colors that didn’t go well with my photos.

I have a huge stamp collection, so I sometimes will stamp my background and/or embellishments, and I use my computer, too. There is a fair amount of clip art on the internet available to use. The downside is that it takes more time, but I figure that it’s better than waiting years for the manufacturers to come out with the lines that I need or want.

Since scrapbooking is popular with Mormons and Utah is the scrapbook mecca (things have changed a bit from 20 years ago though) maybe that's why we get more traditional topics? I am amicably divorced but I don't like everything from the "we" perspective, I noticed that when making my daughter's baby album.

I started scrapbooking in the late 90's and then it became really popular. Out of all my friends and family who used to scrapbook my Mom and I are the only ones left who still do it. And my Mom has become a Christmas, wedding, birthday scrapbooker so like scrappyrabbit said I think the typical scrapbooker is an event scrapbooker.

That's why it is handy to have cutting machines (and good old punches) to make what I need some time. Also ironically I always buy the pretty patterned paper and then usually end up using the B side more muted pattern. I have found tone on tone patterns are my go to.

While I am giving my 2 cents (LOL) I am tired of the peachy pink orangey color, EP is the most guilty of constantly using it. I now buy their coordinating paper because it can be so hard to match so maybe they are evil geniuses. Also the gold that is in everything that sometimes looks like baby poop color, American Crafts is most guilty of that.

I've been using my Maggie Holmes stash the last couple of days and I noticed that her collections have every every shade possible of peachy pink coral and the spicy brown mustard baby poop color. 
But hey, maybe Maggie was listening about LESS PINK and she decided coral would be a great alternative. No, that can't be right. There's still so much pink in her collections. 

This topic is frequently discussed here, which provides manufacturers free customer feedback/market research. Yet, they continue to produce the same themes/icons/color palettes/etc. From manufacturers' perspective: If it isn't broke, don't fix it. Manufacturers don't stray from the status quo because it sells. Especially during a pandemic/economic uncertainty, companies are typically more risk-adverse & hesitant to invest in products that may not sell well.

I have gone to crops with 200+ people and you see people loving on the things so many of us complain about. That stuff sells.

I stopped scrapping for a couple years and am on a spending freeze so I’m not super up on new products and trend, but the similarity between things I saw when I came back were and three years before was disheartening. Part of why I stopped was because everything was so themed, I hated the colours and trendy icons, and the “perfect”, “best ever”, and “we/our” stuff was making me roll my eyes.

I’m still in the process of going through everything a purging all that stuff as I start getting back into scrapping. The amount of stuff that I bought because ‘if only I was more creative’ or ‘when I bought the next new product’ I could made it work somehow is shocking.

FWIW the stuff that has seemed to stand the test and that I’m happy to have are background or geometric stamps/stencils, stationary (alphabet, label, bullet list/planner tracking grid stuff, roller date) stamps, and tiny type stamps (Citrus Twist). I know not everyone likes an ‘office’ vibe or minimal style, but they’re things that don’t really age or lock themselves into one style or theme. Same with tools - geometric and things like label punches, a tiny attacher, good inks, blender, heat gun, etc.

When I see really similar lines between companies I always think that they picked the designs from a sort of catalogue of images that are produced in mass by graphic designers who churn out everything they can think of hoping someone will want to buy the rights to one of them. The designer makes it as broadly appealing but with one safe quirk as possible to make the sale, the manufacturer picks the most broadly appealing of those to make their sale. The lines with a person attached (TH, Heidi Swapp), already have a large fan base on their side and don’t seem to designing with a something for everyone need.

I think that’s why I’m surprised no one has picked up where Basic Gray left off - the fan base already exists, so fitting into a specific style niche seems like a reasonably safe bet.

Late to the topic and great comments so far.

I am a mega theme scrapper and always have been. I just did a mountain climbing scrapbook for my brother and ordered every piece of mountain paper I could find, most from Scrapbook Customs and Scrap your trip.

At the crop I walked around. There were 15 ladies scrapping. 95 percent of them were using a corner rounder, cutting photos willy nilly and slapping them on a piece of cardstock or a piece of floral paper.

Most all had paper pads of themed paper like beach, baby and birthday. They seemed like they had never even had a basic class. Several were watching videos, using templates and punching border strips.

I notice this every crop I go to. The individual groups are enthusiastic about one another's layouts and no one in a group is doing anything out of the box, "advanced" or dimensional.

It has been said before and was said very well right here on this thread: peas are not the sales demographic that keeps companies on business. SEI is a prime example of color palate versatile papers that went belly up.

The books people are making are baby, school, vacation, Christmas, Disney, wedding, heritage, travel, and children/family which includes birthday or sports. Of course those all overlap.

While a masculine line with golf clubs and grills drives me nuts, they will use that even if no one in their lives ever picks up a golf club. They don't care like that.

Frankly I think the majority of scrapbookers have always scrapped like this and most have no page design sense at all. They are happy cutting and pasting.

They watch videos like we used to look at magazine idea books and still slap those photos on the page haphazardly. We here are not them and not the customer that keeps a company in business sorry to say.

As others have said those who speak up on this board typically are the minority in the big picture of the hobby. Also, themes tend to be an easier way to scrapbook. If I’m doing a trip, grabbing a themed trip scheme and maybe a page maps pack will help get it done simply and quickly. Not many actually do it for creatively purposes either. And honestly getting pictures off the phone and out for people to see is a feat in todays world.

Preserving memories on social media is a dangerous game says the person who suffered a Facebook hack that never did result in me getting back my old account.

My motivations for scrapbooking have changed over the years. When I started it was to preserve those baby memories. And then it blossomed into creativity and now it's come back to being about the journaling mostly. The decorations are just a bonus for me at this point. I enjoy looking back on my more artsy layouts. They are definitely pretty. But really 22 years later, I've realized it about the story now.

And for the people still standing through this fad, it's mostly about getting pics off phones and into albums. I'm not seeing journaling. I'm not seeing techniques. But I see a lot of people letting the theme tell the story. So it makes sense to me that this is where the money is made

I go to day crops and weekend retreats quite often. I was just at a retreat over the past two days. Everyone else was doing themed layouts or prepackaged kits. Those kits include an instruction packet and everything precut. Those premade kits sell very, very well. Anything Disney, too. Some of the gals work on just the kits all retreat long and are very happy just putting those together. I am usually either the only scrapper doing mixed media at the smaller 1-25 retreats or one of a few at a large 100+ retreat. Come to think of it, I don’t notice anyone doing planners or travelers notebooks either. I’m definitely a rarity with my arty, one or two photo, non-chronological one page layouts. 

In addition to what’s already been said I think when Project Life rolled in, a lot of people jumped on that style of scrapbooking, and then the Planner craze rolled in (and has remained). The companies who offered traditional scrapbooking products chose to stick with their bread & butter designs, or they pivoted to the trends. EP is definitely in the former category in my mind at least.

I’ve never really been a theme crafter aside from Christmas.
I used the original Indigo Hills collection from PinkFresh for my wedding album, for example. Sure I have stuff in any/every theme but not 12x12 papers and such. It’s more my stamps and dies that fill that role. I do not think of myself as a traditional scrapbooker though because I don’t have kids; I was single until my 30’s, and I make cards more than layouts.

I agree with the Pea who said that they listen to the shop owners & retailers.

I figured you know all the reasons but you are good at generating good topics for discussion.

Yeah. Kind of feel we need to get over it already. If it wasn't selling they would not continue making it. I don't necessarily do themes, but I'm happy that there is the stuff there is available, and we have the internet to find it.  I can pick and choose what I want. I remember a scrapbook I made before I ever came across a CK magazine. Now that was stuff was ugly. I re-did that book. I guess if one really wanted to get to the right people one could contact the company directly.