A Happy Home Is One That Buys Stuff
Corporate America is blundering around like a particularly drunk blind man in search of some marketing tactic that will grab the hearts and minds of the public during this nightmarish, never-ending economic turmoil. And now they think they may have found it: comforting images that remind you that, hey, friends, family, and a happy home are what's really important now, not material things. (**EXCEPT FOR OUR COMPANY'S PRODUCT, THX): Companies are bringing back their old classic jingles to remind you of a happier time, before mortgage payments and credit card debt and your whore wife sleeping with the fella who came to repair your A/C. "I am stuck on Band-Aid brand cause Band-Aid's stuck on me!" "I don't want to grow up, I'm a Toys 'R' Us kid." Poignant. Even IKEA is encouraging happy homes:
"We felt the emphasis of home was about the value of being home than what was inside the house," says an Ikea spokeswoman.
That's just because your furniture depreciates at an alarming rate, IKEA! If only there was a go-to quote machine to explain this marketing phenomenon with a vague, unverifiable platitude:
Faith Popcorn, chief executive of marketing firm BrainReserve, says "people are looking for warm, cozy places to curl up in" in the current economic climate. "We are in a period of shock right now, and we are looking for respite and revival and restoration."
Faith Popcorn's favorite place to curl up: in front of a computer, with a fat sack of salvia.