Music is key in many subcultures—it unites, energizes, and creates shared experiences. Whether it’s at a festival, a club, or just singing lyrics out loud… Read More »Listening alone? You are still part of something bigger
Laughter is the most social of human expressions. When hearing someone laugh, we cannot help but laugh or smile ourselves. It is sociable in a… Read More »Should we use humor to talk about issues?
Tech bros, broligarchy, fascisme… The headlines have been piling up over the past weeks, with Trump and Musk making waves. Why do men who exaggerate… Read More »Is this hidden crisis fueling toxic masculinity?
The recruitment agency YoungCapital launched its ‘Boost Your Boomer’ campaign, which imagines young workers donating their bodily fluids to create an energy drink that powers… Read More »When kids teach parents how to navigate life
According to psychology, loneliness peaks in young adulthood and late life, following a U-shaped pattern. The factors leading to social isolation differ significantly between early… Read More »🦧 Gen Z’s redefined journey to adulthood
Christmas is, for many, the only time of the year they feel compelled to sit together with a large family around the dining table. Although… Read More »8 Expert tips for managing heated conversations during Christmas dinner
A study conducted by the Dutch newspaper Trouw in collaboration with Ipsos and UvA professor Digital Humanities Rens Bod explored how contemporary definitions of meaning… Read More »What gives meaning to our lives?
The horror genre, whether in movies or books, has long mirrored our cultural anxieties, adapting its themes over time to expose what lurks in our… Read More »How horror confronts us with our collective nightmares
Last week, a tense moment unfolded in Dutch politics when a decision had to be made about creating an emergency law for asylum seekers. Although… Read More »Abracadabra: how words can shape our reality
Style magazine The Face recently coined the term “Generation Boomerang,” referring to the phenomenon that whereas previously most 18-to-34-year-olds in the US lived in a… Read More »Postponed adulthood: Redefining traditional milestones
A bi-weekly newsletter in which we keep track of what’s going on in the world and translate based on our sociocultural knowledge, what this means to brands.
Before Kim Pillen started as a trend consultant at TrendsActive, she worked for four years as a creative strategist at Dept. For brands such as Philips, bol.com, Beiersdorf, JBL, and the Consumers’ Association, she built (online) campaign, brand, and social media strategies. After four years, she decided that she wanted to better understand people and society in order to advise brands more effectively. That’s how she ended up at TrendsActive. Here, she can do what she loves most: digging into people’s needs and then working with brands to see how and where they can be relevant and meaningful.
Aljan has been widely recognized as an inspiring professional speaker on the critical trends that will shape society in the decades to come. He works as the Head of Inspiration at TrendsActive, a trend consultancy from the Netherlands using social science to human-proof business decision for brands like
Next to his role at TrendsActive he is the Community Director at the Institute for Real Growth where he inspires and connects a global community of +400 CMOs.
He has been on the board of the Dutch Platform of Innovative Marketing for almost a decade. Regular speaker and moderator for the Dutch Marketing Awards and 3 times winner of the best of MIE.
Kees his purpose is to help ambitious leaders and brands to human-proof their business. In 2003 he founded TrendsActive, a trend consultancy enabling brands to become more human centric.
Kees consults global brands like
and many more.
Next to being the founder of TrendsActive, he is also initiator of the first academic trend master for executives at the University of Utrecht and is initiator of various trend studies and white papers on subjects like trust, meaning, visual culture & generations.
