RAGE! Does anyone else share my rage at all the branding bollocks we are inflicted with in this day and age? It’s bad enough that every waking moment we are bombarded with advertising – on the street, on the bus, on the TV, on the radio, in the newspapers, on the internet, at the bottom of emails, as we turn on our computers, as we pick up our phones, a whole world geared up to find new ways of selling new stuff that we don’t need and never shall through the new gadgets on which our lives become more and more dependent.
And then there’s a whole new level… such as, for example, the ‘brand exclusion zone’ being set up around the London Olympic site. This obscene idea takes branding to a whole new level. Within the 1km or so ‘exclusion zone’ around the main Stratford stadium, not only will you be unable to buy any food other than that approved by McDonalds, or drink any drink which isn’t sourced by Coca Cola, but you will be unable to buy it with any credit card other than Visa and – in an act of almost barbaric stupidity – spectators wearing overtly branded clothing which isn’t approved by the Olympic committee, can be asked to remove it, or themselves. Great rings of legal apparatus have been thrown up to ensure that, for the duration of the games, only those companies which have paid through the nose for the privilege (and I grant you, every penny the taxpayer didn’t spend is welcome…) will be permitted to advertise their goods or even reference the Olympics, and we, the spending customer, will not only be bombarded with images of their goods, but flatly monopolised by them.
I find the very idea of branding, utterly counter-intuitive. Buying heyfever medicine a few days ago, I was given a choice – between a budget hayfever tablet and one containing precisely the same ingredients for £2.50 more, which had a brand. ‘Some people like the comfort of a brand,’ explained the pharmacist, as I sneezed and dribbled over her counter. ‘They like knowing they’re better off.’
“But, it’s the same medicine, yes?”
“Oh yes!” she sighed. “Absolutely the same stuff.”
When did this happen to us? When did we, as a society, decide that we couldn’t think for ourselves? When did we stop reading what was on the back of the package and just look at the shiny brand stamped on its front? Sure, there are certain brands in which I trust… nutella, for example, is an infinitely better chocolate spread than Tesco’s own brand… trainers which cost £8 from Shoe Zone are more likely to disintegrate than those which cost £30 from Clerks, fine, but this isn’t an exercise in market forces, merely common sense! This is a process of us, the consumer, using our judgement, wisdom and experience to determine a) which chocolately condiment we prefer in the morning and b) how many miles of pavement pounding we’re going to get out of our shoes. I don’t need to spend £150 on a pair of shoes because Adidas says it looks cool! Indeed, I’d feel a shudder of horror at the merest notion, someone feeling as if with every stride I take, another pound of damage is inflicted on these over-priced wanderers! I don’t need bling by Burberry, don’t want the perfume of movie stars, don’t see why because some C-list celebrity I’ve never heard of chooses to wear a certain type of underpant, I should wear those pants too. It’s not just offensive to my intellect and common sense, it’s actually insulting to people as individuals, reducing us from the chaotic mis-mash of bits-of-this and bits-of-that thrown together and shaken about – which is essentially all people ever are – into mere cliches of ‘Nike man’ and ‘Monsoon woman’, our bodies bought up and turned into advertising copy for a company whose ideals stand for no more and no less than profit and global uniformity. Who are they to define my kind of cool? Who are they to tell me what food I should eat, what clothes I should wear, what holidays I should desire, what houses I should live in, bombarding me with a vision which is not my own from every corner of my daily waking life? I am my own kind of cool, individual and unique, and I defy anyone to stick a brand on that.
5 comments
Hunter H says:
June 29, 2012 at 2:06 pm (UTC 1 )
“Cool from Kate Griffin” that will sell by the truck-load.
Jeanne says:
June 29, 2012 at 8:58 pm (UTC 1 )
And they keep doing it because it works!!
Is it because most of us are basically too lazy to read the fine-print? We know that Tylenol, in an effort to regain market share, has made their packaging tamper-proof vs the store brand? (Which has the same packaging if we took time to look.). I think us lazies figure that if some famous figure is staking their reputation on a brand of underwear, they are probably worth the risk and we don’t have to do any research on our own.
So either we are too lazy, or we go the other way – cramming 12 lbs of potatoes in a 10-lb bag and not taking the time to read labels because the kids need to be picked up and the family fed and the lawn mowed and even though it costs more it is easier…
Catherine says:
July 1, 2012 at 1:02 pm (UTC 1 )
You raise many excellent points. I quite agree.
I go to the independent chemist at the far side of the shopping area because they’ll sell me generic cetirizine for £3 cheaper and the chain-pharmacists don’t.
I feel it’s baffling being an uncommercial person in our society.
Tim S says:
July 2, 2012 at 10:48 am (UTC 1 )
I’m always slightly baffled by the way that people treat generic medicines. They are basically identical to the branded version but most people seem to think they are slightly dodgy. I even once saw the business presenter on BBC News refer to them as “cheap, knock-off versions”, which is a long way from the truth.
The part of branding I have the most problems with is branded clothing. Plain black polo shirt £10, black polo shirt with brand logo on the front £50. So I’m supposed to pay well over the odds for the privilege of turning myself into a billboard, how did that become normal?
Anna_Wing says:
July 3, 2012 at 4:34 am (UTC 1 )
A jewellery company I came across actually had advertising encouraging its customers to “merge their identities with the brand.” I had visions of squamous horrors emerging from odd corners of space-time, diamond necklaces dripping from their tentacles…
I can however seriously recommend the traditional Burberry trenchcoat (with detachable wool lining). I have had mine for 25 years, and apart from the occasional button re-sewn and the water-proofing needing to be renewed from time to time it has stood up very well. I expect to keep wearing it for the next two decades at least. It has no equal as a reliable most-weather coat (no good for tropical weather or continental winters, but it is good for almost anything else). Likewise, the Gucci loafers bought in 1997 are only giving up the ghost now (the leather is splitting, nothing to be done about that), after being around the world in various sorts of extreme weather for more than a decade and a half. All they ever needed was occasional re-soling. The trick is to look for brands that were originally famous for being good at something in particular and stick to buying that thing only. Anything they produce that changes from year to year can safely be ignored.