I was surprised when I got home last night to hear on my answering machine a message from Christine, the “Loyalty Team Manager” at Autoland, where my wife and I purchased a car two years ago. Christine wanted to let us know that she and her staff were in a “Yes We Can State of Mind,” and that if we wanted to know more about what that meant then we should call and arrange to come in to talk.
How sweet of Autoland to capitalize upon the Obama-inspired can-do spirit in the country in an attempt to separate me from my credit.
This Sunday is the Super Bowl — that annual bacchanalia of gluttonous consumption — and as many of us settle in to watch the Steelers and the Cardinals (in what should be a very good game), we’ll be scratching our heads at subtle and not-so-subtle attempts to tap into the national mood, for profit. Commercials during the Super Bowl cost $100,000 a second, and while a few are clever and original, most treat viewers as pigs who like nothing more than bikinis, chicken wings, beer, and trucks. Cultural and consumer trends tend to filter into these ads, threaded through anthropomorphized animals and talking babies. Clips last year mocked wine tasting, mismatched celebrities, showed how easy it is to buy stocks, and hawked GPS systems.
I’ve got two predictions. One: Christine and the Loyalty Team at Autoland aren’t the last folks who’ll invoke Obama in a sales pitch to me this week. And, Two: Steelers 24, Cardinals 20.
* 10-minute post-post update. Just sent to me by my wfe, who was much more diligent in her research… check out this Pepsi ad that will run Sunday, especially the logo at the end:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFAF-bR6Y0o[/youtube]
Go Steelers! Sorry, I just got nostalgic over my days at the University of Pittsburgh.As per Recession, the good thing about being a graduate student is that you are so used to the “Yes, We Can State of Mind,” at least when it comes to finances, that you really don’t need to learn how to live on a restricted budget. That ‘s all you have been doing anyway. Closer to my home front, I am also worried about how small countries are weathering this storm. The Eastern fringes of Europe are not doing well, while I hear my economist friends talk about the “inherent flexibility” of the American economy. Let’s stretch and flex then!
It’s not exactly SuperBowl related, but this is our recent hit.http://www.benjerry.com/features/yespecan/
“Yes Pecan”? Amazing. My favorite Obama-inspired marketing pitch unfortunately can’t be linked to (at least not that I know of): my mother showed me a half-page advertisement in the Jewish Weekly Press for an enterprising hat store that had super-imposed a large, black hat (shtramel) traditionally worn in some Orthodox Jewish communities onto a picture of a smiling Obama.