I find myself going the opposite way, strangely, as I've always been a cheap ass that dismissed major brands out of hand as "you pay more for marketing"

Whether its just me that has flipped, or just fiat clown world impacts on the means of production, I'm not too sure... There's some paradox at play...

Goods in a sound money society should get better and cheaper all the time, but in fiat clown world this isn't the case, because manufacturers cut corners to slow cost increases... so it's bizarro fiat clown world where things get worse and the costs trend up.

There's also too much product arbitrage and not enough differentiation in fiat clown world, I can scroll all day on Amazon looking for polo shirts for example... and the only distinguishing characteristic between them is usually if it's a lindy brand or not.

I don't think a lindy brand is more capable of making a better shirt necessarily, but I do think they'll spend extra on the production side to keep a moat around that brand... so sorting by highest price first is the only filter I have to go on unless I want to scroll through chinese brand shirts for 3 days.

I'm definitely still a cheap ass, every dollar spent is a sat not stacked... so if I'm going to part with sats to buy something, I am ultimately investing in that thing to fill a need... that means buying the shirt I most suspect is not going to go to shit after a few washes.