I bet you answered, No! As did I.
But even though our rational mind tells us not to JUMP along with everybody else, we seem to keep doing it again and again! We often think we are so smart that of course we wouldn't do such a dumb thing as to follow along because everybody else seems to be doing it. Well, I suspect Advertisers of any and all products counts on you to follow, just because your friends are doing it!
They even tell us that "all your friends" are buying this, or that celebrities are leading the way in convincing us that this product or idea or fad is wonderful simply because others think it is...
I fall for this gimmick of "BUY THIS" so often that it has started to make me feel quite uncomfortable! Big things and small things....
Lately I have REALLY been listening to the claims made in TV advertisements... One I noticed is a flagrant copy of another... There has been an ad -- well actually it is usually a Paid half hour advertisement -- Cindy Crawford's skin creams -- you know the one where the great French doctor has discovered a rare extract from a even more rare melon... Really how rare could this melon be if they sell this skin cream all over the world? Do you think that if you ordered this stuff that sometime they might say, we are short of the rare melon extract so we are unable to fill your order? Well now, we know very well, that is not going to happen! In fact this idea of a famous doctor and a rare natural ingredient has obviously gone over so well, that now there is another cosmetic product advertisement that claims it contains an extremely rare "stem cell" extract from a sought after unusual apple that is only found in Switzerland by another brilliant doctor! I am sure that these cosmetic skin and face creams are fine and excellent quality products, but why must they tell us that some ingredient is rare or exotic or unusual.... I suspect that sometime soon, we will be buying something that contains the unnatural red dust of Mars with no real reason except that it is rare and from Mars and some celebrity says it is a miracle!
Influence. It is so easy to wind its way into the simplest things of our life.
The strangest thing set me off on these thoughts....
I am, as usual watching a show (Doc Zone on CBC) on TV while working on a crochet project. I actually have about 3 crochet projects on the go, and could easily be working on one of them, but no.... A few days ago I got an email -- yes I subscribe to emails that actually want me to buy stuff, I tell myself it is a way to keep up with new things... I was fooling myself! So in this email, the company sent me an email "update" of a kit for a scarf and something about it caught my eye... It was for a Boteh Scarf and had a really enticing photo.... Something about it tho made me hesitate. Well, I always hesitate when buying crafty stuff, cause I often can live without it, whereas buying a loaf of bread or a jug of milk never causes me to question what or why I am buying it...
I really liked this scarf! And it looked like it would be an interesting challenge and something a bit different.... But still, I spent another day thinking about it.... THEN like the proverbial light bulb, I realized I already had this pattern in one of their crochet magazines -- I just had to find it... After leafing through a dozen or so issues I FOUND IT! OKAY! no need to buy that pattern... but you know what gets me about it? NEW. Yes a NEW KIT is what they are selling, but hey? the pattern is in a magazine from WHAT? SEVEN YEARS AGO!! Now to sell as an individual pattern along with an expensive yarn and call it a KIT is an excellent marketing ploy...
For a change tho, I didn't jump off that cliff simply because someone implied that everybody was doing it and it was something new and fun to do!
I think, after alot of years of believing what "they" tell me, I am learning to stop and think about the claims being made about how I would really be missing out if I didn't follow everyone else over the cliff! Even if maybe there really weren't so many others jumping....
Oh Boy! Now what have I done? Becoming more thoughtful about the claims of product or idea sellers...
PS. The yarn in the kit is a 'sock yarn' so that too was easily on hand in a basket of yarn I had on the shelf and therefore I did not have to take another penny (oh yeah, we don't use pennies in Canada anymore) out of my pocket to satisfy my urge to try out this unusual scarf pattern...
I am developing new eyes to look at some of the 'claims' made on consumer products...
