Tag Archives: marketing

The similarities between selling kitchen appliances in the 1950s and today

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Selling the kitchen has been a key component of the sales pitch for homes for decades. Adweek takes a look at how the sales pitch from the 1950s is similar to today’s pitch:

It goes like this: If you want to make that new fridge and stove desirable, advertise it as part of a kitchen that’s desirable. So long as homeowners blush with shame over their cracked linoleum and dated cabinetry, showing them the meal-prep space of their dreams is likely to spur them into buying the new appliances that go with it. Want proof? Take a look at both of the appliance advertisements below.

“History repeats itself because these ads are really quite similar,” observes graphic designer Ken Carbone, co-founder of the design and branding company Carbone Smolan Agency. “In their own way, they both say ‘modern’—and they both promise bragging rights, as in, ‘you too could have this!’”…

Move to 2011, and Jenn-Air appliances are using the same kind of dream-kitchen sell GE did 56 years before, but with key aesthetic variations. “In the old ad, color itself says modern, and stainless steel is the secondary element,” Carbone notes. “Today, it’s inverted. Stainless steel is the hero.” He’s right. We’ve entered the era of the home chef and industrial chic. It’s also obvious that the Levittown ranch house’s 32 x 25-ft. footprint has morphed into McMansion proportions. (How else to fit that granite-topped kitchen island?)

Thematically, however, it was the same old pitch about the same new kitchen. “Both companies knew their audiences, and both were selling bragging rights,” Carbone says. “It’s just that the first ad suggests macaroni and cheese and the second fusilli al pesto.”

As a bonus, you can look at the original 1950s Levittown kitchen advertisement below the story.

Doesn’t this suggest that Americans are still falling for (or attracted to, depending on your perspective) for the same pitch based on “bragging rights”? Is this a good or bad thing? The pitch is still the same: get the right appliances to portray a certain image to others. The content of this image has changed, domesticity in the 1950s versus “professional” cooking today, but it suggests advertisers correctly tapped into the American psychology.

Are there other effective ways to sell kitchen appliances?

Thinking about kitchen appliances, I wonder how many Americans replace them while they still function just fine in order to “keep up with the Joneses.”

Become friends with your Toyota

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Companies are looking for ways to leverage social networking sites for their own purposes. Now Toyota announces plans to create their own social networking service where you will be able to become friends with your car:

Toyota is setting up a social networking service with the help of a U.S. Internet company and Microsoft so drivers can interact with their cars in a way that’s similar to posting on Facebook or Twitter.

Japanese automaker Toyota Motor Corp. and Salesforce.com, based in San Francisco, announced their alliance Monday to launch “Toyota Friend,” a private social network for Toyota owners…

With the popularity of social networking, cars and their makers should become part of that online interaction, [Toyota’s president] said.

“I hope cars can become friends with their users, and customers will see Toyota as a friend,” he said.

There is the whole purpose of this: strengthen the relationship between customer and product. I wonder if Toyota owners would really flock to this concept. They might be loyal customers because of the value and reliability of Toyotas but is there a fervent fan culture that would want to be part of a social network?

But there is an interesting phrase in this article: “cars can become friends with their users.” Perhaps it was not intended this way but it implies that cars have agency. The article talks about how newer cars, such as plug-in electric vehicles, need more monitoring and so users will be open to getting more information from their cars. But in the end, these cars are just cars, machines that help people get around. We are a ways from having cars that could hold human-like conversations with their owners (see this recent piece on progress in tackling the Turing Test).

While some commentators have lamented the difference between off-line and online friends, perhaps this is the next controversial step forward: friendships with products. Right now, you can be a “fan” on Facebook but a friendship implies a closer and more interactive relationship.

Altoona, PA to become “POM Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold”

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It is not just businesses that don’t mind being part of a film that negatively portrays product placement. Tomorrow, the city of Altoona, Pennsylvania will get a new name: POM Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold. Why Altoona? Sheetz is a key sponsor of the film (paying at least $100,000 to Spurlock) and the company is based in Altoona:

Sheetz said it was Spurlock’s idea to have a secondary premiere, hopefully in a town that would name itself after the movie. Sheetz helped sell the idea in Altoona, and the locals seem enthused by the concept…The locals needn’t worry too much. The name change is ceremonial — meaning people won’t have to address mail using the movie’s title. The film was in the can before the naming rights deal was approved earlier this month by city council, on which Bruce Kelley serves as vice mayor. The money is going to the police department.

[Vice mayor Bruce] Kelley said he’ll leave it to marketing experts to debate how much advertising is too much, but said the city is solvent and doesn’t sell the naming rights to anything other than trees people can pay to have planted in someone’s honor.

“So we’re all going along with the gag. We’ve become part of the shtick,” Kelley said.

“But you’re not going to see ‘POM Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold’ on the side of our fire trucks.”

So, at least there are some boundaries! Seriously though, the city is getting $25,000 to be renamed for a short period of time and the money seems to be going to a good place.

But there are some larger issues that this article could or should address:

1. Aren’t there other communities that have done similar things in the past? Truth or Consequences, New Mexico (Wikipedia explanation) is a classic example.

2. The vice mayor says Altoona is solvent but I wonder what their budget status really is. Many communities are experiencing budget issues and I wonder how many might go through with something like this to get some quick cash. The CTA seemed to indicate that it is interested in such efforts.

3. This vice mayor suggests “marketing experts” should figure out how far is too far in the selling of commercial advertising. Perhaps we need a national survey on this: when Americans are presented options about how the Federal government or more local governments should raise money (or cut spending), why not include a questions regarding the option of selling advertising rights? While we have some commentators who seem up in arms about this practice (including Spurlock), what is public opinion on this issue? For example, Apple sponsoring a Chicago El stop drew some initial attention but I haven’t heard anything since.

A call for a sociological study of (digital) piracy

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John C. Dvorak suggests that we need more (sociological) research on the causes of digital piracy:

Understanding why piracy exists as a phenomenon needs to be better understood, but it should be up to academics, not me and other pundits, to determine the causes. Where is the great sociological study of piracy and the mentality behind it?

Dvorak briefly discusses what he thinks are the three roots of piracy: price, distribution, and marketing. At the end of the piece, he again calls for more research:

The real problem with piracy, again, is sociological. If an entire generation becomes acculturated to the free exchange of content and code, then the industry is doomed or it will have to cut back on its First Class Travel and rethink its models. Moaning and groaning about piracy will not stop it…

I’m not sure what can be done about all this, but it does need careful study, not more columns.

Sounds like it could be an interesting project. One angle would be to see how piracy has developed as a deviant (or not-so-deviant) behavior.

Some thoughts by Joel: Actually, there have been some really good academic studies of digital piracy published recently.  I wrote up some thoughts about the SSRC‘s 400+ page report titled Media Piracy in Emerging Economies in early March, and a few weeks later there was the (much shorter at 18 pages) London School of Economics paper entitled Creative Destruction and Copyright Protection:  Regulatory Responses to File-sharing.  Both are well worth reading (for sociologists, especially the former).

2010 Census director on suburbanization of minorities

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Sociologist Robert M. Groves spoke earlier this week “at an Advertising Research Foundation event.” In his comments, Groves noted one of the major demographic trends in America: more minorities are now in the suburbs.

Of course, if Groves — with a Ph.D. in sociology and a long-time Michigan professor — were to put out a “for hire” sign for TV networks, a bidding war could heat up between Univision and Telemundo. The story of the 2010 Census, which could have been written in 2005 (or 1995, for that matter), is the boom in Hispanic America…

Last year left Groves well-armed with figures about the Hispanic population, such as the prevalence of those speaking Spanish at home and English elsewhere. And he has much to say about a dispersal trend in the Hispanic community, the departure from cities. In the Atlanta area, for example, the number of Hispanic residents spreading to the collar counties is soaring.

“The suburbanization of the minority population is a phenomenon over the past decade,” Groves said.

While the American suburbs have typically been seen as places where whites attempted to escape the city and minority populations (“white flight”), the number of minorities in the suburbs has been on the rise (read about this on a national scale here and in the Chicago region here and here).

The article goes on to consider how Groves might also be in demand as businesses look to utilize this kind of demographic knowledge:

Broadly, Groves has some cred if he were to become a network ambassador to Madison Avenue. At some level, he’s overseen a massive campaign — stretching from a Super Bowl spot to targeted marketing in 28 languages — as with the Census spent $300 million to $400 million in advertising last year.

As the Bureau sought to get more Americans to return their questionnaires, it figured that for every 1% increase it produced, that would save $85 million in the costs associated with knocking on doors later.

“The message got through and it changed behavior,” Groves said.

The director can also say he can manage a budget. The Bureau returned $1.6 billion to the government last year as it completed its work.

Before becoming director of the 2010 Census, Groves was well known in sociology for his work with surveys. This article suggests that he could parlay this Census experience plus his prior research into a lucrative corporate position.

An innovative revenue stream for suburbs: exclusive advertisements on city property

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Naperville, Illinois is considering a new tactic to provide for funds for the city’s coffers as there is nearly a $5 million budget shortfall projected for next year:

Naperville is considering an unusual option for long-term revenue: giving corporations exclusive rights to advertise on city property.

In a memo to the City Council this month, finance director Karen DeAngelis cited several examples of how this could work, including a program in which KFC pays for pothole repairs in cash-strapped cities in exchange for stamping the fresh asphalt with the chicken chain’s logo.

Naperville also could sell the naming rights of buildings or allow companies to advertise their products as “the official drink” or “the official burger” of the suburb for a fee, DeAngelis said.

“It’s not something we’ve done before, so we would be on the leading edge and we would need to be careful,” she said in an interview.

This might lead to some very interesting scenes – “Naperville City Hall, brought to you by Geico.” I imagine such ads might be attractive to businesses for the amount of people who might see them, particularly in a vibrant downtown Naperville.

Would a majority of suburban residents go for this? As one expert suggests in the story, this could lead to some negative repercussions and a process of “NASCAR-ization.”

If the city of Naperville couldn’t raise a significant amount of money with a program like this, would it be worth doing it on a small scale or would it just lead to more trouble than its worth?

The D+ Campaign

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Drake University has unfurled a new marketing campaign built around this symbol: D+. While the scheme has been criticized for linking the college to a bad academic grade, the school suggests it is helping differentiate Drake materials from materials from other schools:

The education blog of the Des Moines Register reports that Tom Delahunt, vice president for admission and student financial planning, and Debra Lukehart, executive marketing director, responded to faculty and alumni criticism via an e-mail message. Conceding that faculty and staff members should have been allowed to preview the campaign before its release, the letter nonetheless explains that the concept was rigorously tested on 921 mostly Midwestern high-school students.

In an online survey, “more than three-quarters of the respondents indicated the cover grabbed their attention either a little or a lot,” the letter says. “In addition, nearly 90 percent of the respondents felt the concept was unique from other college and university materials they have seen.”

In a market (college admissions) that saturates students with materials, perhaps getting the attention of students is all a school could hope for.

Starbucks to expand far beyond coffee

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Starbucks, one of the best symbols of globalization through the spread of its stores and its use of the international coffee commodity chain, is looking to branch out. At about a dozen stores around the world, Starbucks has been testing the sale of wine, beer, and more food. These stores have been informally named “Olive Way.”

This comes in face of competition from retailers like McDonald’s and also in the interest of expanding Starbuck’s reach to customers beyond 11 AM.