Weird Marketing Strikes Again

GE sells light bulbs. Lots of light bulbs I'd imagine. One of their specific lines is the "Reveal" bulb, which, they say, provides "clean, beautiful light™" that "makes colors 'pop'." Probably a nice thing to have, but I have converted to CFLs in most parts of my house. In the living room, the lamps have amber colored mica shades, so I think using a bulb that filters out the yellowish color of a regular incandescent seems like a waste.

I was out shopping at Target with a friend yesterday when he remembered that he needed an light bulb for inside his stove. He went off to the find what he needed while I examined the clearance endcaps. When he came back, he had a 40W GE "Reveal" appliance bulb. Is it really necessary to make sure the roast in your oven has colors that pop? Of course you can also use one of these bulbs in a refrigerator. Does the broccoli look better?

Maybe it's just me, and I'm missing out on the wondrous look of the cold or cooked food.

Ummm, "thanks" CVS?

I have some paint for my living room walls that I bought on clearance at Restoration Hardware. The color is "washed acanthus"; it's a very pale green. Very very very pale green. Like somebody opened a can of white paint and whispered "green".

A few weeks ago, I read that CVS was going to reward customers for not using plastic bags, thus jumping onto the green bandwagon. But based on what I saw in the store the other day, and the fine print from their website*, it looks like they're not really going green, they're going washed acanthus.

Sure, twenty-five cents for not using a plastic bag sounds good, except unlike, say, Kroger, who gives me a straight five cents per bag off my total right then and there, CVS only gives you "extra bucks" credits. And of course you have to collect four bag credits before you actually get a coupon for $1. Which has an expiration date.

Oh, and did I mention that just having the CVS Extracare Card isn't enough? (Kroger and Ukrop's don't require a card.) No, you have to buy a "green bag tag" for 99 cents, so it's going to take four transactions before you even start to break even. Possibly more, I haven't bought a tag so I don't know if they'll charge sales tax.

It gets better. If I take my growing collection of reusable bags to the grocery store and need six of them, I'll get 30 cents right back in my pocket. And if I went back to the same grocery store later that day and needed two of my bags, I'd get another 10 cents. At CVS, you are limited to one twenty five cent credit per person per day.

How many marketeers did it take to come up with the plan? They want to look "green", but they're really no more than washed acanthus.

*To earn Extra Bucks® for a transaction in-store, your ExtraCare® card, Green bag tag, and reusable bag must be presented with purchase at checkout. Limit of one Green bag tag use/scan per day per household. Every fourth purchase your Extra Bucks reward will print at the bottom of your cash register receipt as a $1 coupon good for your next purchase. Extra Bucks can be used until the expiration date shown on the coupon.

No. Just no.

Paste Magazine, what were you thinking?

I've been a subscriber to Paste for many years. There were a few lapses, but it's been at least since the issue numbers were in single digits. I've had my issues (ha ha, "issue", get it?) with their brainless subscription fulfillment service, but those got resolved. I still think they're brainless though. But that's another post.

At some point the magazine decided to send an email newsletter, called "Paste Lifeline", which is mostly not worth the paper it's not printed on, but occasionally I've found an interesting item or two, so I didn't unsubscribe.

I know they've been struggling financially, but somebody was hitting the bottle or bong a little too hard when they decided to send out an ad for "Full Sail University" as a "Paste Lifeline Special".

No actual newsletter content at all, just the ad.

Seriously Paste? Somebody thought this wouldn't piss off your subscribers?

I don't want your spam. Or your magazine or newsletter, now that you mention it.

Like Losing an Old Friend

I've primarily been working from home since April, so I don't go out for lunch very often. Truth be told, even before April I'd taken to brown-bagging it most of the time. When I did decide to splurge on a non-homemade lunch though, Jersey Mike's was always on the short list. They made a really good version of a good ol' Philadelphia-style hoagie.

Even with the working/eating at home, I had a bit of a craving for a Jersey Mike's sandwich, so I headed out at 11:30 AM (to beat the crowd) and ordered up a "Regular 13." Imagine my surprise and disappointment to see the guy behind the counter cut a full-size roll in half and start to build my sandwich on that.

"I asked for a 'regular'" I said.

"That's a regular, you can order a 'giant' if you want more."

I felt like I'd been punched in the gut. Time was when a "regular" was enough to have for lunch and dinner (although I'd usually eat up the whole thing anyway). Now it was just a half a sandwich.

I told them to forget it and walked out.

For a dollar more, I got a full size sub from a small locally-owned place across the street, and they even included the chips.

G'by Mike. It was fun while it lasted ...

update 11/11/2009
Oh yay, a response:

Dear Larry,

Thank you for taking the time to fill out an e-comment card regarding
your visit to our Glen Allen, VA location.

We appreciate you sharing your feedback with us. Your comments are
valuable to the Corporate Office and our franchise community. Your
comments have been forwarded to the owner to address.

We apologize for any inconvenience and thank you for sharing your
experience with us.

Way to actually address the issue raised, there, Mike's.

Political Sidenote

Barack Obama's Facebook presence posted an update requesting support of the health care plan currently in the House.

My response: 'Yeah, I'll be a "fierce advocate" for your plan. Based on your example, I think that means sitting on my hands and not actually doing a damn thing.'

Delta Loves to Fee. And it Shows.

I got an email from Delta Airlines today. They were advertising a "U.S. Flights Holiday Sale" OK, cool, I'd considered flying down to Orlando to visit Mom and Dad for Thanksgiving. I clicked on the link in the email and up popped a browser window showing . . . the main delta.com site. Ummmm, great. But where's the fare sale?

Up also popped a window inviting me to take a survey about my visit to delta.com today. I'm always up for that. I worked my way through various questions about the website and then they hit me with one that said that Delta was considering offering a new service - you don't have to wait at the baggage claim area .. for $40, they'll deliver your baggage to any location within 40 miles of the airport, within 6 hours. Would I pay for this? I can sort of understand that, but no, I've been doing the carry-on only thing for all my travel so I wouldn't pay for it.

The next question though . . . Delta is considering offering insurance: for $8, they'll insure (up to $2000) that they'll actually get your bags to your destination airport. Umm, WHAT? Seriously? They'll charge you to check one bag, charge you more to check two, and then on top of that, they'll charge you to actually GET THEM THERE?

That would be a big Hell to the Naw there, Delta.

A Case of Mistaken Identity

Back when GMail was all shiny and new and invitation only (and hey, speaking of Google invites, hit me with a Wave invite somebody) I was excited to get my own GMail address with my choice of username that corresponded to the net.identity I'd been using for several years.

And then along came another guy who seemed to think that my email address was his, and the spam started. I could hop into my spam folder and tell you an awful lot about a guy named Larry who lives near East St. Louis. And then more people started getting GMail addresses, and some certain subset of them continue to think that they're me. I get marketing emails from a boat company. I get agendas for school board meetings. A couple weeks ago, I got a full description of a wedding ceremony, who would enter when, what music should be played, when vows would be exchanged, etc. I replied to that one saying that it all sounded lovely, but I had no idea who Roy and Yasmin were and why I was getting that email.

Yesterday, I received an email entitled "Verizon Wireless Order Confirmation". It came from the oh-so-helpful address of "donotreply@verizonwireless.com". I use Sprint and haven't had any contact with VZW ever, so I knew it wasn't for me. Within the email was the full name, address, and soon-to-be-live mobile phone number of a gentleman in Arizona. Now this was either the guy in AZ not knowing his own address, or the guy at VZW typing it in wrong. In any event, it's still not something I should be getting. There was nothing in the email giving me any way to contact Verizon Wireless by email or web; however I did locate the name, toll-free number and extension of the salesman for this transaction, so I placed a call. I left a voicemail trying to explain that I wasn't the guy in AZ, and left my number so I could help them resolve this problem.

That was well over 24 hours ago. I've heard nothing.

So fair warning, VZW customers. If you're not very careful, your personal information might get sent to somebody else. Somebody who might not be as honest as me. And apparently, VZW just doesn't give a flying fig.

Confused by Advertising

I got my new issue of Make magazine in the mail today. There's an ad on the inside cover from Ford, advertising the "Sync" feature available on several of their vehicles.

The text says "It's the captain of MP3s. Your words are the DJ." OK, um, what? In what world do captains and DJs go together?

On television, there's an ad for some type of cat litter product that shows several different cats hiring a bloodhound to help them find their litter boxes. Now I don't know about you, but I don't want my cat to not be able to find his own litter box.

And ass effects Aciphex still cracks me up.