Babies named Alexa

American babies named Alexa retreating as Spam sales rise. Two completely unrelated household lines on opposite sides of the regression line: one a name made awkward by a smart speaker, one a shelf-stable lunch meat finding new buyers.

The Alexa baby name fell sharply after Amazon's Echo (2014) made the word a default smart-speaker prompt. Spam sales grew from about 144 million cans annually in the early 2010s to a record 240 million during the pandemic, with sustained higher levels since. Two completely unrelated lines on opposite trajectories sharing a window because the same fourteen years saw a smart-speaker-driven name retreat and an inflation-driven canned-meat resurgence.

A name retreated. A canned meat returned. The decade was practical about both.