Monday 5 January 2015

If irritation occurs, discontinue use

Here's some actual company information from the labelling on an actual product (specifically "My Coconut Island" bath and shower gel, from the "treaclemoon" brand):
We like to create products that you will love to use [the market for bubble bath that customers will hate to use is thought to be rather limited] ... scrumptious smells, fabulous textures and a "look" that will sit with pride in your bathroom. It's a special little team who make treaclemoon happen... take Charles Henry Nelson, our rather random garden gnome whom we consult about all elements of creative and design... His lilac and yellow knitted socks are unusual but necessary... and there's Matilda Fizzbucket our bubbly chemist who has a cat with turquoise whiskers an of course me, Dunc and Sarah.
Cue cries of 'What a bunch of quirky funsters!' and 'Where can I buy their stuff?'

People who bought this item also bought an animal print onesie, many chocolates, a box set of Miranda episodes, hilarious novelty slippers and the largest bottle of Bailey's known to humanity.

At the other end of the insultingly stereotypical gendered branding spectrum sits the tag line for Alpecin Caffeine Shampoo ("German engineering for your hair"), because Real Men don't buy hair care products, unless they're cunningly disguised as something the Top Gear team might take for a test drive. In real life, the dead protein filaments that grow out of your head have very little in common with a German car and trying to combine the two is usually a mistake.

On the whole, I'd say that there are probably enough irritating real people in the world already, without manufacturing irritating artificial personalities for brands, too, but maybe that's just me.

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