Consumption Markets & Culture

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Buy now pay later services as a way to pay: credit

consumption and the depoliticization of debt

Julia Cook, Kate Davies, David Farrugia, Steven Threadgold, Julia Coffey, Kate
Senior, Adriana Haro & Barrie Shannon

To cite this article: Julia Cook, Kate Davies, David Farrugia, Steven Threadgold, Julia Coffey,
Kate Senior, Adriana Haro & Barrie Shannon (2023) Buy now pay later services as a way to pay:
credit consumption and the depoliticization of debt, Consumption Markets & Culture, 26:4,
245-257, DOI: 10.1080/10253866.2023.2219606

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CONSUMPTION MARKETS & CULTURE
2023, VOL. 26, NO. 4, 245–257
https://doi.org/10.1080/10253866.2023.2219606

Buy now pay later services as a way to pay: credit consumption

and the depoliticization of debt
Julia Cooka, Kate Daviesa, David Farrugiab, Steven Threadgolda, Julia Coffeya, Kate Seniora,
Adriana Haroa and Barrie Shannonc
a
School of Humanities, Creative Industries and Social Science, University of Newcastle, Newcastle, Australia; bSchool
of Education, Deakin University, Melbourne, Australia; cEducation Futures, University of South Australia, Adelaide,
Australia

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

The use of buy now pay later (BNPL) services has grown rapidly in recent Received 5 April 2022
years. Existing research has considered the regulatory challenges they Accepted 26 May 2023
pose, but further work is required to map their significance as a means
KEYWORDS
of normalizing and naturalizing debt. In response, this article focuses on Buy now pay later; consumer
the situated landscape of marketing and branding of BNPL services credit; debt; marketing;
through analysis of their websites and apps, a walking ethnography of a personal finance
large shopping centre, and interviews with BNPL customers. We find
that BNPL services nurture a “structure of feeling” that is reminiscent of
digitally intimate online spaces, and claim that by generating a sense of
pleasure and fun they distinguish themselves from other comparatively
“serious” financial services. We ultimately contend that this aids them in
presenting themselves as simply a “way to pay” rather than a form of
credit, arguing that this represents a significant new step in the
depoliticization of debt.

Introduction
This article responds to Langley’s (2014a) call for greater attention to the consumption of credit. It
focuses on buy now pay later (BNPL) services, which have grown rapidly since the mid-2010s in
relation to both their use and their availability and considers their sociological significance. Pre-
vious research has identified affects of indebtedness (Davey 2019; Dawney, Kirwan, and Walker
2020; Lazzarato 2012), and has focused on how the interfaces of digital pay-day loan providers
shape customers’ interactions with them via their design (Ash et al. 2018). We seek to extend
this work to consider the affective appeal of BNPL services by analyzing how their digital interfaces,
online spaces and branding practices generate a specific “structure of feeling” (Anderson 2014;
Williams 1971) that is reminiscent of digitally intimate online spaces. We argue that in addition
to explaining some of the appeal of these services for young women (who constitute their largest
market) this “structure of feeling” nurtures a sense of intimacy, pleasure and fun. This enables
BNPL services to position themselves as simply a way to pay rather than a form of credit by associ-
ating them with a sense of fun and frivolity that contrasts markedly with the seriousness of legacy
financial services. This development represents a further evolution in credit as a consumer product,
in which the affective appeal of a product is used to mask its status as a form of credit. The

CONTACT Julia Cook julia.cook@newcastle.edu.au School of Humanities, Creative Industries and Social Science,
University of Newcastle, SR.161, Social Sciences Building, Callaghan, NSW 2308, Australia
© 2023 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://
creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the
original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way. The terms on which this article has been published
allow the posting of the Accepted Manuscript in a repository by the author(s) or with their consent.
246 J. COOK ET AL.

significance of this finding stems primarily from the social consequences of the normalization and
naturalization of debt. Amid welfare state retrenchment, wage stagnation and growing inflation
increasing numbers of vulnerable consumers are turning to forms of consumer credit that carry
with them high costs and other unfavourable conditions (such as limited consumer protections
in the case of BNPL services) to supplement their income (Dagdeviren et al. 2020). These forms
of credit are increasingly used to meet the costs of social reproduction, meaning that if the costs
of debt servicing become unsustainable they pose significant material limits on the population’s
ability to continue to reproduce itself (see Roberts and Soederberg 2014).
BNPL services allow customers to purchase a product from a merchant (whether online or in
store), receive the product immediately, and then repay the cost of the product to the third party
BNPL service in instalments on a set timeframe. They have been compared to in-store services
such as lay-by (in which merchants put aside an item that customers pay off over time, and receive
at the end of the payment period), but are perhaps more reminiscent of existing instalment-based
methods of repayment that allow customers to take goods home while paying for them over time
(RBA 2021). There are two key differences between BNPL services and existing instalment-based
payment methods. Firstly, they are provided by a third party rather than the store that the customer
is buying goods from. Indeed, the majority of BNPL services charge the merchant for a percentage
of each sale and then provide the balance of the sale to the merchant. Secondly, BNPL services are
accessed digitally. Customers engage with them either through their websites or via their apps, each
of which are used to apply for approval for a spending limit (essentially a credit limit). Although
BNPL services are used primarily for online shopping, their use for in-store purchases is also
mediated through their apps which generate a scannable barcode or QR code, or provide a virtual
card that can be used for both in-store and online transactions.
Advocates of BNPL services have argued that they are beneficial for consumers because they do
not charge interest and make the bulk of their revenue from merchants rather than customers
(AFIA 2022). However, research has shown that customers using BNPL services spend more
than they otherwise would (ASIC 2018), and it is on this basis that merchants agree to partner
with them. Additionally, peak bodies such as Financial Counselling Australia (2021) have reported
that their members have witnessed a significant growth in BNPL customers entering into loan
cycles similar to those experienced by pay-day loan customers (see Banks et al. 2015; Stegman
2007) and using credit cards and other forms of credit to pay off BNPL debts to avoid late fees.
When combined with findings that consumers are increasingly using BNPL services to cover
expenses such as food, rent and utilities (FCA 2021), these conditions can be read through Soeder-
berg’s (2014) concept of the “debtfare state” in which social risks have been increasingly privatized
in the neoliberal era, and the naturalization of the experiences of debt that result from this have led
to the equation of debt with individual moral failings, rather than with systemic inequalities.
In this article, we draw on an analysis of BNPL websites and apps, a walking ethnography of a
large shopping centre in Newcastle, Australia, and interviews with BNPL customers. Empirically
this article provides an analysis of a financial product that has attracted widespread public attention
but has rarely been considered in academic research. Conceptually the article extends Langley’s
(2014a) work on the consumption of credit by considering how a credit product can successfully
market itself as a desirable consumer item while masking its status as credit. In so doing it also
extends existing work on credit and affect. While existing work has focused, for instance, on the
need for credit card users to have an affective attachment to their debt in order to experience a
sense of obligation to repay it (see Deville 2015), we explore the role of affect in the consumption
of credit, focusing on the affective appeal of BNPL services.

Buy now pay later, financialization and consumers

Due to their relatively recent emergence as a significant market force BNPL services have been
addressed predominantly in relation to the regulatory challenges that they pose in the extant
 CONSUMPTION MARKETS & CULTURE 247

literature (see Gerrans, Baur, and Lavagna-Slater 2021; Johnson, Rodwell, and Hendry 2021). BNPL
services are, however, situated within what has been termed the financialization of everyday life,
referring to the penetration of financialized logics into individual and household decisions and
behaviours (Adkins 2018; Martin 2002). They also form part of a recent expansion and normaliza-
tion of consumer credit (Langley 2008; Pellandini-Simányi and Vargha 2020; Roberts and Soeder-
berg 2014) and, as stated above, can be understood with reference to the work of Langley (2014a,
2014b) and others (Deville 2015; Marron 2014) who claim that credit products themselves have
been repositioned as consumer goods. Specifically, these authors argue that credit products are mar-
keted as part of an overall lifestyle, facilitating aspirations for and access to a desired future (see also
Bernthal, Crockett, and Rose 2005). We take this account of credit products not simply as vehicles
for consumption, but as a consumer good in their own right, as a point of departure for this article,
using it as an entry point for considering how BNPL services use branding and marketing to pos-
ition themselves as attractive to specific consumer identities and desires. Branding specifically tries
to personalize a company’s relation to consumers. Branding and marketing therefore underpin “the
affective relations between brands and consumers, which typically include some degree of trust,
respect and loyalty but may also include playfulness, scepticism and dislike” (Lury 2004, 10). In
his work on cultural branding Holt (2004) has also considered how iconic brands gain cultural
power through their role in expressing identity myths that provide a salve for major social contra-
dictions. In his work on Jack Daniel’s whiskey Holt claims that the brand’s cultural power stems
from its role in sustaining a specific ideal of masculinity informed by a revision of the frontier
myth. We draw on this work to consider how the branding of BNPL services may similarly seek
to aid consumers in managing major social contradictions, with a particular focus on the way
that BNPL services are marketed to young women.
Research on BNPL customers has consistently found that young women form their largest cus-
tomer base, and that the average age of their customers is lower than that of other financial products
such as credit cards, personal loans, and pay-day loans (ASIC 2018; NCOSS 2021). Many BNPL ser-
vices appear to purposely market themselves to this customer base (as discussed later in this article),
although none have publicly explained their rationale for doing so. Their focus on young women
forms part of the expanding “feminisation of finance” through which the financial services industry
has increasingly turned its attention to women as an under-exploited consumer market by offering
products that increasingly expand into the domestic realm of the home (Allon 2014). This reading
resonates with BNPL services, which are used primarily for online shopping (RBA 2021). In
addition to representing an under-exploited market, women are often constructed as ideal subjects
of marginal lending because they are viewed as cautious and risk averse when compared with men
(although the reality may be more complex than this – see Nelson 2015) and are disproportionately
likely to bear the brunt of the social risks that have increasingly been shifted from the public to the
private sphere over recent decades (Allon 2014). While this literature helps us to understand why
BNPL services may target young women in the marketing of their products, we leave discussion of
how BNPL services seek to appeal to young women to the latter part of this article.
Recent research addressing digitally mediated loans has focused on the digital interfaces that
mediate the relationship between the customer and loan provider. For instance, Ash et al. (2018)
have considered how high-cost short-term loan products are accessed and used in consumers’
everyday lives, and how their interfaces shape consumers’ engagement with them by reducing prac-
tical, affective or emotional “frictions” that may cause them to pause or stop the process of applying
for a loan product. Notably, BNPL services are used primarily for online shopping, and are
mediated through digital interfaces even when they are used for in-store purchases. For this reason
they present parallels with the interfaces described in Ash et al.’s (2018) research. Moreover, BNPL
services are marketed to prospective merchant partners on the basis that their use reduces “cart
abandonment” – a phenomena in which customers shopping online leave the site after selecting
items, but before paying for them (see Kukar-Kinney and Close 2009). Notably, this reinforces
the relevance of Langley’s (2014a) claim that far from being an already-present product of a mis-
248 J. COOK ET AL.

match between one’s income and desire for consumption, demand for consumer credit is actively
manufactured. Although we are similarly interested in the design and representation of BNPL ser-
vices in this article, we take a different approach by focusing on how the appeal of BNPL services is
shaped not by their specific design, but by the affective appeal that they nurture. We outline our
approach to analyzing this in the following section.

Theoretical framework
The conceptual framing of this article takes inspiration from Bajde and Rojas-Gaviria’s (2021) work
on consumer responsibilization in the online micro-lending market, which draws on Anderson’s
work on neoliberal affects. In explaining his focus on affect, Anderson (2016) argues that collective
affects form part of the conditions that allow for the formation of particular expressions or iterations
of neoliberalism, and that understanding the affective life of neoliberalism is thus central to under-
standing how it emerges, forms and changes. Drawing on these claims, Bajde and Rojas-Gaviria
(2021, 493) study consumer responsibilization in the online micro-lending market by understanding
consumer subject creation as “a process animated by affective encounters” and attending to the ways
in which these affective encounters are mediated by the online platforms on which they occur. In so
doing, Bajde and Rojas-Gaviria (2021, 498) identify how a particular structure of feeling – an atmos-
phere of aspirational hope – is nurtured by intermediaries in the online micro-lending market to
“shape the capacities of prospective lenders to affect and to be affected by social problems, such as
poverty”. The authors then show how apparatuses of affirmation and relatability are employed to
intervene into affective encounters in order to cultivate affective subjects who “feel empowered to
act as entrepreneurial agents of social change” by providing disadvantaged borrowers with loans,
or to cultivate a sense of intimacy and closeness that constructs a similar sense of responsibility, lead-
ing to the provision of a loan (Bajde and Rojas-Gaviria 2021, 503). Bajde and Rojas-Gaviria (2021,
495) follow Anderson (2014) in understanding a “structure of feeling” as “a pervasive atmosphere or
collective mood that exerts a force on how life is lived and experienced in certain socio-historical
settings”. Put differently, a structure of feeling informs how people comport themselves to the
world in a given time and place. We follow Bajde and Rojas-Gaviria in taking up this definition.
Bajde and Rojas-Gaviria’s (2021, 493) focus on structures of feeling and apparatuses are each
informed by Anderson’s (2014) “affective analytics”, and their analytical framework “approaches
consumer subject-creation as a process animated by affective encounters – consumption encounters
through which people’s capacities to affect and to be affected are transformed”. It is thus particularly
well aligned with our aim of understanding what, beyond specific terms and conditions, is appealing
about BNPL services; an aim that prompts us to interrogate their affective appeal.
Our understanding of affect is drawn from the work of Anderson (2014, 9–10) who defines it as
consisting of “bodily capacities to affect and be affected that emerge and develop in concert”, and as
pertaining to the capacities, rather than existing properties, of bodies. We follow Anderson’s
approach to operationalizing this definition into a means of analyzing affective life. For Anderson
(2014, 11), this begins by attending to “differentiated capacities to affect and be affected” such as
exhaustion, pain and greed. It then entails tracing how affects “emerge from and express specific
relational configurations of images, discourses and affects, whilst also themselves becoming
elements within those formations” (Anderson 2014). We draw on this approach by considering
how BNPL services seek to affect their customers by engaging in relational configurations that
are familiar to young women, who form their primary consumer base. Importantly, BNPL services
are most commonly encountered through visible symbols at the point of sale and through their apps
and websites, and as such are typically encountered through representations and discourses.1
1
The relationship between affect and discourse is a point of contention for many affect theorists, with some viewing them as
inherently separate (Massumi 2002) and others reading them as inseparably entangled (Wetherell 2012). However, we
argue that a strict separation between discourse and affect is both methodologically and analytically untenable. We follow
Anderson (2014, 6) in viewing affects as having the potential to bind to and become attached to “almost anything”, including
 CONSUMPTION MARKETS & CULTURE 249

Methods
This article addresses the following research question: how are BNPL products represented in digi-
tal and physical spaces, and how does this shape their affective appeal? We chose to study the pres-
ence of BNPL services in both digital and physical spaces because, while typically associated with
digital spaces, they are also used in-store at the point of sale.
Three inter-connected studies underpin this article – they each form part of a programme of
research on young people and “new” forms of debt. The first study focused on the digital presence
of BNPL services on apps and websites. We conducted a content analysis of the websites and apps of
eleven BNPL services. Eight of these services were accessible via websites and apps (Bundll, After-
pay, Klarna, Openpay, Humm, Laybuy, Fupay, and Zip Pay), and three only had a website presence
(Pay It Later, Latitude Pay, and Payright). The BNPL services included in this study were identified
through a review of apps available in the Apple and Google Play app stores, review of financial ser-
vices blogs and websites, and review of reports from industry bodies such as the Australian Secu-
rities and Investments Commission (ASIC). Only those available in Australia (and thus accessible
for us to download) were included in the study. However, the rapid development of the BNPL mar-
ket means that new services have entered the market since we conducted our study in late 2020–
early 2021, meaning that it is best considered as a “point in time” snapshot of the BNPL market
in Australia as opposed to a definitive review. Data collected from the apps and websites were col-
lated and analyzed individually by the first two authors using a shared data sampling frame which
was developed inductively during a pilot phase of the study (Holman 2017). The resulting data cat-
egories included images, text, interactivity and overall design for each website and app. Sampling
and preliminary data analysis were then cross-checked and thematic codes generated inductively
as a team. The thematic codes (combined with those that emerged during the second phase of
the study) form the basis of the findings presented below.
The second study was an analysis of physical representations of BNPL services. Data were col-
lected using the method of walking ethnography, which has been proposed as a useful means of
studying the “everyday” (Yi’En 2014). It is a means for not just observing but also experiencing
embodiment and the social patterns of others (Lee and Ingold 2020). For this study, we were inter-
ested in exploring sites of everyday consumption and viewing representations of BNPL services
from a customer perspective. The first two authors visited 215 shops across one large shopping
centre and adjacent homemakers’ precinct in Newcastle, New South Wales. The shopping centre
that we visited is one of two large centres in the city of Newcastle (approximately two hours
north of the state capital of Sydney by road). Each of the centres are roughly the same size and con-
tain many of the same chain stores, and the choice of one centre over the other for data collection
was informed by the proximity of the homemakers’ precinct, which broadened the range of avail-
able stores. We initially visited five shops together to compare notes and moderate data collection,
and then divided the data collection equally, discussing our observations intermittently throughout
the process. A shared data sampling frame was used to collate field notes on what, if any, BNPL
products were advertised in store, the type of signage, and their placement in stores. Data were col-
lated and analyzed individually, and the two researchers then generated themes inductively
together.
The third study was based on interviews conducted with 29 young adults (aged 18–29) who had
used BNPL services. These participants were recruited via paid advertising on Meta and flyers
posted in public areas such as supermarkets and community noticeboards, and a professional
recruitment company was contracted to recruit the latter half of the sample when recruitment
began to slow down. Twenty-four of the participants identified as women, and five as men. How-
ever, the gender imbalance of the sample does not adversely affect this article due to its focus on

discourses. Specifically, we understand affects as emerging from “specific material-discursive arrangements” that are already
entangled with and mediated by discourse (Bajde and Rojas-Gaviria 2021, 506).
250 J. COOK ET AL.

young women. All of the participants used BNPL services primarily or exclusively online and
accessed them via their apps. When paired with wider usage patterns showing that BNPL services
are used primarily for online purchases (RBA 2021), this reinforces the relevance of our focus on
digital spaces. This study was approved by the University of Newcastle human research ethics com-
mittee under protocol number H-2020-0219 and the names provided for the participants are
pseudonyms.

Findings and discussion

The following discussion is divided into two sections. The first section, titled “BNPL, affect and
relatability in digitally intimate spaces” begins by considering the similarities between BNPL
apps and websites and social media sites, drawing on the example of Pinterest. In doing so, this sec-
tion claims that BNPL apps and websites and social media platforms make similar affective appeals
to consumers, cultivating affects of relatability that nurture a fun and pleasurable structure of feel-
ing. The remainder of this section is dedicated to explaining the specific affective appeals that BNPL
services make to young women, and why they are successful. The second section, titled “BNPL ser-
vices as a way to pay”, explains the significance of the structure of feeling nurtured by BNPL apps
and websites. Specifically, it puts forward the argument that this fun and pleasurable structure of
feeling helps BNPL services to distinguish themselves from other forms of consumer credit, allow-
ing them to present themselves as simply a “way to pay”. We ultimately argue that the represen-
tation of BNPL services as a “way to pay” rather than a form of debt represents a further
development in the normalization and de-politicization of debt, as well as a new development in
the consumption of credit.

BNPL, affect and relatability in digitally intimate spaces

While analyzing BNPL services’ websites and apps we found that some of them contained fea-
tures, aesthetics and affective appeals that were reminiscent of those seen on social media plat-
forms. One example of this is provided by Klarna, a Swedish fintech firm that launched their
BNPL service in Australia at the beginning of 2020, which includes an “inspiration” feature
on their app that allows users to engage with a collage of styles and items that interest them.
Specifically, users identify trends that they are interested in (for instance “vertical stripes” or
“earthy tones”) and then receive curated suggestions within the app based on these preferences.
This feature mimics the functionality of Pinterest, an image sharing and social media platform on
which users “pin” images that correspond with their interests and are then recommended similar
or related content. Such tools are described as being helpful for customers, using taglines such as
“Tell us what you like to help us find the best ideas for your inspiration” (Klarna), though in
reality they are targeted marketing devices designed to personally tailor users’ consumption
experience. Notably, Pinterest – like BNPL services – has a predominantly female user base,
with male investors initially passing on it because they were unsure what people (men) would
do with it (Phillips, Miller, and McQuarrie 2014). Phillips, Miller, and McQuarrie (2014) identify
that while Pinterest bears a resemblance to the conventionally female activities of scrapbooking
and collage, it is primarily oriented towards future consumption rather than past memories.
Jones (2016) pushes this argument further, contending that Pinterest’s scrapbooking aesthetic
is “an alibi” for the labour of yearning and self-surveillance that users engage in. Jones’ reading
of Pinterest resonates with features found on BNPL apps. Several of the BNPL apps contained
similar features, and three of the interview participants in our study brought up their use of
these features, even though this was not covered in the interview guide.
We argue that the similarities between BNPL apps and websites and other social media sites are
significant because these platforms each make similar affective appeals to consumers. Specifically,
we contend that BNPL services draw on discourses, images and affects that have been central to
 CONSUMPTION MARKETS & CULTURE 251

the creation of digitally intimate spaces on social media sites such as Pinterest, Instagram, and
Tumblr (Dobson, Robards, and Carah 2018), on which young women interact, and that in so
doing they create a “structure of feeling” reminiscent of these online spaces. Specifically, this is a
“structure of feeling” based on a sense of relatable fun that facilitates the purchase of consumer
items marketed to women (most often clothing, accessories and gifts). The concept of digitally inti-
mate spaces draws from Berlant’s (2008, viii) “intimate publics”, which are comprised of “strangers
who consume common texts and things” and encompass the collective dimension of intimacy. The
concept is well suited to analyzing mediated forms of social intimacy, and has thus been adopted for
the study of intimate publics in digital spaces. We argue that the structure of feeling cultivated on
BNPL apps and websites is nurtured through affects of relatability and feminine sameness that are
reminiscent to those found on social media sites popular among young women, and which allow
young women to experience the consumption of credit via BNPL as fun and pleasurable in a
way that contrasts markedly with their experiences of other forms of credit (as expanded on in
the following section). Importantly, many of our interviewees described their use of BNPL services
in affective terms by, for instance, identifying Afterpay as “my fun thing” (Alana, late 20s) or “just
for fun” (Megan, 20), and discussing the enjoyment associated with buying “slurgy boogie baby
clothes” best categorized as satisfying “wants rather than needs” (Elsie, late 20s). Additionally,
although all of the participants engaged with BNPL services alone – typically while shopping online
from their home – and even hid their use of these services from significant others in some cases,
they nevertheless identified the use of BNPL as a normal feminine consumption practice. Specifi-
cally, many of the participants identified that BNPL use as “just a normal thing” (Megan, 20) among
both their peer group and young women in their wider age cohort. The shared affective experience
of BNPL services as fun and the imaginings of BNPL as used by a cohort of similar young women
support our reading of BNPL users as part of a digitally intimate public mediated through the
shared use and experience of BNPL services.
We argue that a sense of intimacy and fun is actively cultivated by BNPL services. As a case in
point, the landing page on the website of Laybuy, an Australian BNPL service founded in 2017, pre-
sents a rotating series of tableaus in which Claymation figures are depicted in relatable scenarios.
The first tableau presents a woman lying on her stomach on a lounge wearing headphones and
shopping on her laptop. The scene is domestic – she is clearly in her home, and is wearing an over-
sized jumper, pyjama pants and mismatched socks while a dog lies nearby. When the image rotates
to the next tableau a woman is sitting outdoors in a t-shirt and board-shorts. The domestic appeal of
the previous image is carried over via the presence of a cat and a takeaway coffee cup – each of
which appeal to a sense of feminine sameness by depicting the trappings of contemporary feminine
domesticity in a familiar, yet not idealized way. The following tableaus depict, in turn, a young
woman (comfortably dressed) purchasing clothing at the point of sale in a store, and a young
man lying on the floor with his legs elevated, admiring his new sneakers in a mirror while trying
to take a photo (shoebox discarded beside him). Notably, three out of four tableaus place their pro-
tagonist within a domestic space, and two of them present activities that may be referenced as a
means of self-deprecating humour (taking creative selfies and online shopping in pyjamas with a
pet). The self-deprecating humour latent in these images stems from the fact that they each depict
images of activities that may be a source of embarrassment if they were to be shown publicly, but are
likely to form the basis of relatable anecdotes shared between friends or even as demonstrations of
authenticity online (see Reade 2021). The effect of these images is to create an affective experience of
intimate relatability.
While advancing the argument that BNPL services use affects of relatability to nurture a fun and
pleasurable structure of feeling that is reminiscent of other digitally intimate spaces found on social
media sites we draw from Kanai’s (2019) work, which has identified a similar type of appeal in digi-
tally intimate spaces. Kanai’s (2019) work focuses on young women’s self-representational blogs,
and she argues that the intimacy of these digital spaces is fostered through practices which enact
fantasies of feminine sameness which encourage attachments between the poster and the viewer
252 J. COOK ET AL.

by generating affects of relatability. While the blogs that Kanai studied were posted by young
women who were representing themselves for an audience of other young women, the images
and text used on BNPL websites and apps echo the relatable representations that were displayed
on those blogs. Indeed, by depicting the process of shopping and enjoying products in intimate
and relatable ways that reference knowing and self-deprecating forms of humour these represen-
tations create a structure of feeling that echoes the fun and familiarity of the digitally intimate
online spaces that many of the young women in their target demographic occupy. It is in this
way, we argue, that BNPL services seek to engage their largest customer base.
While many BNPL apps and websites appealed to a sense of relatability, aspirational images and
discourses were also prominent. For instance, Afterpay and Klarna presented highly stylized photo-
graphs of conventionally attractive young people dancing, travelling and socializing. However, the
representation of this form of femininity in online spaces is also closely related to the notion of
relatability, which constitutes the affective pull that draws viewers into a digitally intimate public.
While discussing her research context Kanai (2019, 4) states “relatability is a sense of shared
promise positioning both blogger and reader, not as perfect, but buoyed by a sense of common
desire to remain in a nebulous zone of proximity to it.” Relatability is a means of critiquing feminine
standards of success – such as those represented in the aspirational images and discourses presented
on BNPL apps and websites – while still remaining attached to them and measuring the self in
relation to them. The inability to measure up to these standards becomes a point of commonality
and relatability, but the standards are not abandoned as aspirational goals for young women to ori-
ent themselves to. Drawing on Holt’s (2004) work on cultural branding, we argue that BNPL ser-
vices seek to provide a solution or salve for cultural tensions facing young women. The services
appear to provide a means of aspiring to material progress and normative ideals of successful fem-
ininity while providing space for individuals to fall short of these ideals in an era defined by econ-
omic instability, weakening labour markets and welfare state retrenchment. More specifically, they
provide a means of contending with a context in which discourses of merit, opportunity and equal-
ity have not been matched with structural reorganization around feminist demands for social
change (McRobbie 2009).

BNPL services as a way to pay

After identifying the affective appeals that BNPL services make to young women, and arguing that
they use affects of relatability to nurture a fun and pleasurable structure of feeing, in this section we
discuss why this is significant by linking this claim to BNPL services’ efforts to distance themselves
from the idea of credit. The BNPL services we analyzed, in digital and physical spaces, did not
advertise themselves as providers of “credit” nor acknowledge any association with “debt”. Rather,
every BNPL service website and app presented itself as an easy, accessible and flexible means of pay-
ment. Frequent terms included “easy”, “ease”, “flexible”, “hassle free” and “no stress”. Notably,
BNPL services appeared to be able to position themselves as a way to pay rather than a source of
credit, positioning themselves as services to consume. Indeed, BNPL services are posited not just
as providing an alternate way to pay (alternate to credit cards, cash or electronic funds transfer pay-
ments), but as a better way to pay: “Don’t just pay later. Pay better” (Afterpay). All BNPL services
promoted that the customer can pay in instalments with fee- and interest-free periods (with the
terms of this period noted in less visible text), and emphasized the speed and immediacy of
approval. In this way, BNPL services presented themselves as a distinct service that was convenient
and enjoyable to consume, rather than as a line of credit. The success of this approach is evident in
the fact that BNPL services are now commonplace as payment options for online purchases. In
other words, BNPL services have become normalized and ubiquitous payment methods in the digi-
tal space, typically appearing alongside PayPal and credit/debit options on online shopping
platforms.
 CONSUMPTION MARKETS & CULTURE 253

The impression of BNPL services as a way to pay rather than a source of credit appeared to be
successfully conveyed to consumers, as this sentiment was reflected throughout our interviews with
BNPL users. For instance, Anna, who was in her late 20s, and lived with her husband and three
children aged under six in a single income household described the association that she drew
between BNPL services and older forms of lay-by. When asked if her and her partner thought of
Afterpay and Zip Pay as a form of credit when they began using it she responded:
No, you don’t, because like I said, you didn’t have to put any of your details in like you normally would when it
was credit. Now, I think you have to put your driver’s licence number in, but back then you didn’t have to put
anything but your name, your email, address and phone number and your date of birth. So definitely back
then, it was kind of like a lay-by at a shopping centre kind of thing, but you got it straight away.

The association that Anna drew between the ease of access and seeming anonymity of BNPL ser-
vices and the way that they did not “feel” like debt was reflected throughout the interviews. Hayley,
who was in her mid-20s and was employed casually in the disability support sector, distinguished
BNPL services from banks as a “safer” means of accessing credit that, again, did not “feel” like get-
ting a loan. When asked if she had accessed any forms of credit other than BNPL services she
responded:
No. Because I’ve always thought that kind of credit cards and the way that it’s structured is really, really pred-
atory and then I started thinking about Afterpay and Zip Pay were different from that because it wasn’t really
associated with any bank or loans or finances. I thought that that was a safer way to engage with getting a loan
because it doesn’t even feel like you’re technically having a loan.

When asked a follow-up question about why she would rather use Afterpay than go to a bank to
apply for a loan or line of credit Hayley responded:
I would say because there’s a few things. The way they advertise. The fact that it’s so easily available to get on
an app. That you don’t have to engage with anyone or talk with anybody. It doesn’t seem as serious I guess as a
bank would.

Hayley’s statements illustrate the success of BNPL services in distinguishing themselves from the
“feel” of banks and other sources of credit by nurturing a “structure of feeling” that contrasted
markedly with the seriousness of these institutions. The distinction that our participants drew
between banks and “formal” loans and types of credit and BNPL services appeared to be fuelled
in part by how these services were represented and the affective appeal that they fostered. We
found, via walking ethnography of major shopping precincts, that BNPL services were also com-
mon and normalized in these physical spaces. Of the 215 stores visited, 114 had at least one visible
sign indicating that a BNPL service was available as a payment option. Of these stores, 46 advertised
that more than one BNPL service option was available. The stores that did not advertise the avail-
ability of a BNPL service were typically large supermarkets, clothing stores targeted towards older
customers or small local retail and service outlets.
The ubiquity of BNPL services in both digital and physical commercial spaces was noted by some
of the interview participants as well. For instance, during a focus group discussion three young
mothers (aged 19, 20, and 22 respectively) living in a small town in the Hunter region with their
partners and receiving income support payments noted:
Lillian: You see so much, you’re scrolling through Facebook and an ad for Afterpay comes up or an adver-
tisement for a shop and they’re like oh yeah we have Afterpay.
Raven: More and more shops are getting Afterpay.
Kelsey: And you’ll go through a shopping centre and there’ll be a sticker on the window of almost every
shop saying Afterpay and Zip Pay.

However, following on from these young women’s observations, during our walking ethnography
we observed that the signposting of BNPL advertisements was notable for its lack of attention-seek-
ing. Notices regarding the availability of BNPL services as payment options were generally inte-
grated into the standard instore information about payment options. Oftentimes, the BNPL
254 J. COOK ET AL.

service logos were presented in the store’s own brand colours, rather than those of the BNPL ser-
vice. Small stickers on the front window of the store and notices at the point of sale were the most
common forms of BNPL service signage. Stickers promoting the availability of BNPL services were
also often placed on changeroom mirrors in clothing stores – a quite literal representation of self-
projection and aspiration: “looks great, why not?” (Zip Pay). An exception to the more discrete and
integrated signage was noted in a number of sporting goods stores, where signage was prominent
via notices on the walls, stickers on floors and at various points throughout the stores. Marketing
messages were, in some instances, designed with consideration to the specific type of store, empha-
sizing the “playful” nature of BNPL services. One sign at the point of sale counter at a children’s
clothes store said “Afterpay Yay!!” and another on the window of a bodypiercing store said “Buy
now, cry later” (Afterpay).
The integration of BNPL into both digital and physical commercial spaces fits comfortably
within existing understandings of the expansion and normalization of consumer credit, understood
as a cornerstone of the financialization of everyday life (Federici 2014; Martin 2002). However, in
contrast to existing credit products, BNPL products actively avoid being associated with credit. This
resonates with Langley et al.’s (2019) finding that many pay day loan customers understand the
loans as liquid money, rather than a source of finance. However, we find that BNPL services
push this dynamic a step further by positioning the loaned funds not just as money (as opposed
to credit), but as their own money. The suggestion is that BNPL customers are essentially borrowing
not from a third party company, but from their future selves (for more on the relationship between
debt and futurity see Farrugia et al. 2022). During the interviews we found that, for the majority of
our participants, BNPL services were conceptualized as a way to spread out payments, rather than as
a loan or source of credit. For instance, Christie, aged 30, who worked as conveyancer stated that
she did not use Afterpay because she was short of funds to pay for her purchases, but because she
felt better (“less guilty”) if she spread payments out over time:
I’ve only ever used it on clothes. And only online. And you know it’s only ever been $200 or so that has been
split up over four payments. And the weird thing is that I’ve always had the money there, but I’ve felt like oh I
will just do it on Afterpay and that way it will feel like less money coming out, or less of like “you know, I’m not
really spending $200 on clothes, I’m just spending $50 a week” do you now what I mean. When I thought
about it, I think it’s the breakdown of costs makes me feel less guilty about how much money I’m spending
on work clothes or stuff like that.

Similarly, Megan, aged 20, stated:

Afterpay makes it feel more like it’s still … it just makes it feel like it’s something smaller [than banks] and it’s
your money.

This example suggests that the impression that BNPL products are not credit has been successfully
conveyed to consumers. Importantly, this would likely not be possible without the intimate, plea-
surable and fun “structure of feeling” that is nurtured on the apps and websites that mediate con-
sumers’ interactions with these services, and which attract engagement from young women while
distinguishing BNPL services from other, more “serious” sources of credit. The representation of
BNPL services as a “way to pay” rather than a form of debt represents a further development in
the normalization and de-politicization of debt described by Roberts and Soederberg (2014)
which seeks to move away from the very idea of debt.

Conclusion
This article provides a sociological reading of BNPL services, and in so doing extends Langley’s
(2014a) work on the consumption of credit by considering how the careful representation of a
specific credit product can mask its very nature as credit. We find that BNPL services’ apps and
websites nurture an intimate, pleasurable and fun structure of feeling that is reminiscent of online
spaces that young women occupy by deploying affects of relatability. However, beyond simply
 CONSUMPTION MARKETS & CULTURE 255

enhancing the appeal of these spaces for consumers by providing a product that feels “fun” and
yet allows them to attain aspirational consumer items, the structure of feeling nurtured in these
digital spaces also aids in masking the status of BNPL products as a form of credit. This is achieved
in large part by distinguishing them from better established forms of credit that are viewed as com-
paratively serious. Drawing on this analysis, we contend that the distancing of BNPL services from
other forms of credit it not achieved simply through their efforts to skirt credit regulations (see
Johnson, Rodwell, and Hendry 2021). It is facilitated by the affective appeal that they make to con-
sumers. We ultimately suggest that future research consider the intersection of financialization and
affective governmentality in order to consider how structures of feeling are cultivated with the aim
of shaping consumer behaviour. Empirically, the next steps in this research agenda are consider-
ation of these dimensions of BNPL services from the perspective of product designers, and con-
sideration of how greater regulation of the BNPL industry that is planned in several countries
(most notably the UK and Australia) may impact on the success of their representation as simply
a way to pay.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Funding
This work was supported by a pilot program grant from the Faculty of Education and Arts at the University of
Newcastle.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available on request from the corresponding author. The data are
not publicly available due to their containing information that could compromise the privacy of research participants.

Notes on contributors
Julia Cook is Senior Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Newcastle, Australia. Her research interests include the
sociology of youth, time and housing, and the intersections of each of these topics and economic sociology. Her most
recent research addresses young adults’ pathways into home ownership and young adults’ navigation of debt and
financial assistance. She is a founding member of the Newcastle Youth Studies Centre, a chief investigator on the cur-
rent phase of the long-running Life Patterns longitudinal research programme (2021-2025) and a 2022-2025 Austra-
lian Research Council DECRA fellow.
Kate Davies is a Senior Lecturer in Human Services at University of Newcastle. Kate is passionate about bringing
together research, lived-experience and practice to explore issues of social justice. She works collaboratively in the
areas of homelessness, disability, mental health, child protection and peer work. Kate’s recent research projects
have examined the employment of people with disability in the disability workforce, collaborative autoethnography
methods, participatory social housing models, inclusion of families in child protection processes and young people’s
experiences of debt. Kate is also a community development practitioner who has worked throughout Australia and
the Asia Pacific region.
David Farrugia is Senior Lecturer in Education at Deakin University, and an ARC Future Fellow. His work explores
the relationship between youth and the new economy, including labour, employment, credit and debt. His most
recent book is titled Youth, Work and the Post-Fordist Self.
Steven Threadgold is Associate Professor of Sociology at University of Newcastle, Australia. His research focuses on
youth and class, with particular interests in unequal and alternate work and career trajectories; underground and
independent creative scenes; cultural formations of taste; and experiences of debt. His latest book is Bourdieu and
Affect: Towards a Theory of Affective Affinities (2020, Bristol University Press). Youth, Class and Everyday Struggles
(2018, Routledge) won the 2020 Raewyn Connell Prize for best first book in Australian sociology. His latest edited
collection with Jessica Gerrard is Class in Australia.
256 J. COOK ET AL.

Julia Coffey is Senior Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Newcastle, Australia and Deputy Director of the New-
castle Youth Studies Centre. Her research focuses on youth, gendered embodiments and feminism. Her most recent
books are titled Everyday Embodiment: Rethinking Youth Body Image (2021, Palgrave) and Gender in an Era of Post-
truth Populism (co-edited with Penny Jane Burke, Akane Kanai & Ros Gill, 2022, Bloomsbury).
Kate Senior is a Professor of Anthropology. Her most recent book, Indigenous Youth Futures, explores the lives and
aspirations of Indigenous young people in remote communities in northern Australia. Kate uses a range of arts-based
methods to work with young people to explore their understandings of sensitive issues such as sexual risk and feelings
of indebtedness.
Adriana Haro is a recent PhD graduate and researcher at the University of Newcastle, Australia.
Barrie Shannon is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of South Australia. Their research expertise is in
gender, sexuality and education, having recently published a monograph on trans youth and sex education titled Sex
(uality) education for trans and gender diverse youth in Australia.

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