Swine Flu Presents Grocery Store Marketing Opportunity
Reader Ian spotted this display at his local supermarket.
Ian says:
I saw this today at the Shaw's Supermarket in Goffstown, NH. They must have a surplus of hand sanitizers and masks.
Encouraging good hygiene was never so profitable. We wonder how often they have to remove bacon from the display.
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Comments:
Isn't headquarters one word?
Why not? The Walgreens I pass on the way home from work has an electronic sign that normally advertises things like Bumpits and Snuggies, but not has at least six flu related ads ranging from "Flu Masks "$6.99" to "Daily Flu Shots Given Here" to "Tamiflu Now In Stock". Makes me laugh.
Yes! It's like in South Florida, where each hurricane season I would see fixtures dedicated to disaster supplies - gas generators in Publix, who would have thought?
George Washington. He's a Head Quarter.
How did he manage to blur the top half of the photo, but not the bottom? Poor focus, bizarre phone picture enhancing glitch? A thumbprint on the lens?
I mean, look at that clorox. That is some goddamn sharp clorox. Kleenex starts to get blurry top row, and then it's blobville.
@Vandelay Import Export: Better the head quarters than hind quarters, I suppose. (Hindquarters also one word, I think . . .)
Unfortunately hand sanitizers are not as effective as handwashing for removing germs. You can't sell good hygiene on the end of an aisle.
What *isn't* a marketing opportunity these days?
This looks perfectly reasonable to me. Why shouldn't they market H1N1 preventing products more now? I'd imagine that more people would complain if they *didn't* market this stuff!
Shouldn't 'HEAD QUARTERS' be one word? Is there some meaning in that sign that I'm missing?
@VOIDMunashii: Ohhhh,,,maybe next they'll give 10% off to any Seniors that made it through the 1918 flu epidemic.
@thesadtomato: But if you don't carry a sink with you everywhere you go then it's better then nothing.
Swine flu is a bunch of crap, it's just like the regular flu.
And the media is blowing it way out of proportion, making it seem worster then it is.
People die more from the regular flu every year then from the swine flu, and they more worried about this.
No, they've just got shrunken heads in those boxes. The tissues ensure they don't crumble.
At least it doesn't have those terrible 'virus-killing' kleenex. I think they had a lot of citric acid in them. I tried one once and it irritated my nose a lot, which turned out to be a common complaint. Maybe they pulled them out of the market?
Also, if you're going to use Clorox or similar wipes to kill germs, read and follow the directions. Usually the surface you're cleaning has to stay damp for 10+ minutes, and you will likely have to pre-wash with soap & water. Follow the directions or you get no protection.
/end PSA
This is what is being advertised on television that you should have in your home, office, etc. At least they are not selling worthless "kits" like this one for $49.95 [www.campingsurvival.com]
I was expecting the headquarters to be a little bigger.
God, please don't tell me that's another establishment promoting the use of hand sanitizer.
By the end of this year I wouldn't be surprised to see swine flu already evolving into some super-potent Black Plague.
You think that's bad? The Arkansas Razorbacks football team just launched a ticket campaign that promises fans attending games with the Hogs causes them to develop H1N1 immunity.
@thesadtomato: @Fett101: Hand sanitizers work just fine, but with two caveats: 1) They have to contain at least 60% alcohol, otherwise they do almost nothing; and 2) They won't do any good if there's a substantial amount of stuff on your hands, since alcohol-based sanitizers can't cut through oils.
In any event, they're much better than nothing at all. They have their place, and they do help, even if they are not perfect.
@Vandelay Import Export: This a reverse of the treand to combine everything into one word like Superbowl or highschool. It's like every phrase has been converted into a URL.
@oneandone: I cringe whenever I see something marketed as "virus-killing". Viruses aren't alive, you can't kill them, but you can deactivate them. Kimberly-Clark, you make my head hurt!
@thesadtomato: @Ghede:
The camera on my blackberry flip does the same damn thing. Odd blur, weird fogs. My quicktake back in like 96 took better photos. I was beginning to think a ghost was following me around.
@Vandelay Import Export: @SenorDoucheoisie: Hand sanitizer cannot create superbugs... Antibacterial handsoap can though.
the camera seems to have focused on the Clorox items.
Marketing ploy?
You decide.
Do you think they mean, "H1N1 PREVENTION Headquarters?" Or do they really mean to suggest that this is where H1N1 meets?
What's a "head quarter"
You see this kind of thing almost every year when cold/flu season rolls around. Now it just has the added benefit of a bigger media scare to help the marketing.
@Colonel Jack O'Neill: The media overhyped it earlier this year, true. And yes, in a lot of ways swine flu is the same as the seasonal flus that go around every year. The difference is that now we have two entirely different flu bugs going around, and for swine flu no one under the age of 60 has any immunity to it whatsoever.
As for your statement that "people die more from regular flu than swine flu" - I don't think there's any evidence of that at all, except in the elderly. And the elderly were exposed to the swine flu that went aorund in the 1960s, so they're largely immune (or so it appears right now). I mean, when the swine flu isn't making the rounds in the population, it's pretty hard for people to die from it.
People don't take the flu seriously, which is partly why so many people die from flu complications - they think "it's just the flu" and ignore just deal with it on their own. Maybe now that people are worried about swine flu they'll take any flu bug they get a bit more seriously. I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing.
@Colonel Jack O'Neill: worster? as in WORSTED! AH-HA - The conspiracy reveals! So this flu is really from England and didn't originate in Mexico as previously reported?
Well, well...and they just wanted to be known for their sweet, sweet wool products.
I mean, sure this could be all tied up in the fact that H1N1 is infecting and actually fatal to more younger people than traditional flu is (much like that pesky 1918 flu) and as zoonotic influenzas go, this sucker is usually going through two species instead of one...but, hey, it's really this British connection we need to check!
You are a slick one - it's the 2nd revolution hidden in a silly story for sure!
@ElizabethD: Agreed, but the more people that freak out and maybe actually wash their hands, the less chance I have of getting it.
Throw a bottle of hand lotion in there and it could do double duty as the H1N1/Web Surfing center.
Considering the things that H1N1 Swine Flu has been used as a justification for, a marketing opportunity is probably the least innocuous.
@ribex: Wrong!
He's a quarter head. Confusing, I understand, but one day your life may depend on knowing the difference.
Maybe the sign is a play on words "Head Quarters". I'm guessing that the store manager is not that clever.
I like how the store did such a nice job color coordinating the Kleenex boxes. Someone got done doing that job, looked back at their work said "PERFECT!"
I noticed a similar display at my pharmacy that's inside a grocery store (Dillons). It has a shrink-wrapped pack of Clorox, Kleenex and other such items as a "Flu Kit" for $9.99.
Fred Meyer is selling 'kits,' complete with Lysol, those disinfecting wipes, Kleenex and hand sanitizer, for only $10. I suspect the individual items cost less than the kit. But you'll probably get devoured by the swine flu before you got the chance to get them separately.
@eirrom: This is at all stores, mandated by the corporate office. I definitely did some /facepalming when the word came down.
I don't have a problem with this. I had H1N1 a couple weeks ago and a similar endcap at Walgreens supplied me with everything i needed to keep from passing it to my lovely wife. 2 weeks later we are both healthy. Thanks, marketing strategy!
My wife just had it. She works at a hospital and they make you take the test if you come down with the flu. She missed several days of work, but yeah...it is basically the regular flu. I was pissed because I didn't get it, and would love to use some sick days, and say I had the swine flu.
@Ghede: The sensor doesn't capture the image instantaneously across the whole surface, it starts capturing (in this case probably) from the top on down. This picture isn't of a single moment in time, but is actually many different moments in short period of time, the top of the picture being older than the bottom, the top of the picture was probably taken while the camera was in motion, whereas by the lower part of the picture, the camera had stopped.
Thats my guess anyway.
That's odd... I don't see the Tamiflu.