Okay, now that I have your attention (I hope) I shall proceed. This headline reminds me of the ad (allegedly) created for Subway. A hoarding screams "SEX" and then talks about Subway.
There must be a lot of single people out there in the world today who are sad that they have to "spend Valentine's Day (VD), (pun unintended but delighted at it all the same) alone". Greeting card and chocolate companies and florists must be waiting with bated breath to see if this year's sales will cross last year's. So now what is all the hullabaloo about? I turned to our ever-helpful guide, Wikipedia.
Apparently the legend that St. Valentine was a priest who used to get couples married secretly is hogwash. There is no historical basis to this legend. There would be people, so deeply affected by medieval and modern-day marketing that they would ask me if there was historical basis for God. To them I can only say, as the Telugu saying goes, evadi verri vaadiki aanandam (and no, I do not know if this verri is related to kolaveri, I will hunt down and kill the next person who talks to me about that song). The closest English equivalent would be "to each, his own". The Wikipedia article says that 1.3 billion pounds are spent in England in a year. There was an article in today's ToI which talked about Britons being angry at England still providing aid targeting poverty in India. I think the amount that the British Government spends is much less than what the Britons themselves blow.
So today the main beneficiaries of VD are greeting card companies, jewelry companies, florists and chocolate companies. Apparently till some time back emeralds and diamonds used to cost the same. Soon heavy marketing campaigns started driving up the prices of diamonds (does the phrase "diamonds are forever" ring a bell?), and this has persisted to this day. Today we see platinum being marketed similarly ("when is your platinum day of love?"). Also today everyone wants overt displays of well, love, whether it is PDA (public display of affection), greeting cards, jewelry or the likes. I would like to know the number of girls today who would willingly buy their boyfriends' argument that VD is hogwash and be content with the knowledge that they are loved rather than ask for (expensive) gifts to be bought for them.
When I was in BIT there was this practice of auctioning roses. The price of the last rose invariably used to be more than that of the previous ones. The club which was auctioning would be happy with the proceeds. The girlfriend of the guy who bought the rose would be "oh he loves me so much". The boyfriend would go, "see how much I care about my girlfriend". I would like to know how many of these couples are actually still together today.
So girls, please let your boyfriend/husbands be in peace. The famous ad-man David Ogilvy said, "The consumer isn't a moron; she is your wife. You insult her intelligence if you assume that a mere slogan and a few vapid adjectives will persuade her to buy anything.". Please try to prove him right. If you say you are persuaded after intense marketing campaigns only, I can only say to your BFs/husbands, guys, good luck!
No comments:
Post a Comment