The Media Medusa Pt.1

Same as it Ever Was, Same as it Ever Was, Same. As. It. Ever. Was.

Whenever I find myself having a reasonable discussion on advertising (which is often), I invariably arrive at the same reasonable conclusion; Everyone in 'marketing' should be herded up and driven over a cliff like lemmings.

And at the bottom of the cliff there should be broken glass, in case any of them survive the fall.

And the glass should be covered in salt, so they can really think about what they did, in the time they have left.

At first blush, this sounds a little extreme, I know. Bear with me.

It's not hard to get me going on this subject. All that's needed is to turn on the TV, or the radio, or open a magazine, log onto a computer, attend a sporting event, see a bus, see a taxi, look inside the house, look OUTSIDE...Well, you get the idea. So in order to keep myself from ranting incoherently, I'm going to break it down in pieces of no particular order or size.

Today's installment: The Auto Industry

Between the U.S. and Canada, billions of dollars were pumped into bailing out the floundering corporations, a desperate attempt to save badly needed manufacturing jobs. Their business model, building cheap, shoddy, gadget-laden crap, had been going swimmingly for decades. Every year the corners that got cut in quality, which SHOULD have resulted in a loss of profits, got made up for with marketing savvy.

They stopped selling well-built, durable goods, and started selling us shiny, slickly designed 'lifestyle' accessories. Family cars gave way to behemoth SUV's, as commercials featured happy moms 'having it all' and driving through ravines and up mountains on the way home from soccer practice. Mountains, that incidentally, their children will never see, as they're watching Disney videos in the tv set in the back of the headrest! These kids couldn't find their way home from school, because they've never looked up to see the route!

I won't even go into the specifics of selling sportscars and oversized pick-up trucks to suburban men who'll only ever drive them to commute to the train station. It seems like forever since they began selling these as big-ticket Wonderbras for the ever insecure male phallus. A sociological phenomenom that has caused science and the pharma industry (a rant for another day) to dedicate themselves wholly to the search for the neverending middle-aged erection.

An automobile is a major purchase, in most anyone's budget. They should always have been going to great pains to assure us they got that. But they didn't. They hired marketers, who put together 'focus groups', and they waved doo-dads like OnStar and GPS, and brighter headlights than the other guy in their faces, and convinced themselves, the focus groups, and us (in that order) that those were the important components in making that investment.

And they started to fail. And when they did, instead of putting their faith and trust in a workforce that was proven, that had made them, they cut costs and workers to retain profit margins.

And they continued to fail. So we bailed them out. With very few conditions, and no demand for attrition.

So in a way, we all share a measure of blame, for the fact they remain unrepentent dirtbags. They haven't changed. It's not in them to admit mistakes. They've learned nothing. Because they didn't have to lose anything. They STILL wave shiny baubles in front of us, while we gurgle like babies staring at $30,000 mobiles, just out of reach above our crib.

I really hoped they would have re-evaluated the choices that led them to the brink of non-existence. But 2010 brought another year of asinine commercials urging us to buy a car...Sorry, that's BUY A GODDAMNED CAR because it will read our text messages to us. Or because the entertainment system is equipped with THX theater quality sound.

No,"Whoops, we get it. We'll fix it." No contrition. Just "Thanks for the cow. We used it to get more magic beans. Oh, and we ate the beans."

These guys nearly destroyed an industry that was created in America, and thrived for decades, and they did it by investing in smug, superficial marketing campaigns, because it was easier and more lucrative than building a decent product. And they'll continue to do it, until we hold their feet to the fire....

Which we should do after we herd them. Let them hop to the cliff.