Andrew sent us this picture of a CampusTechShop ad that he says is all over his college campus. The ad trumpets reduced prices on the previous edition of MacBook Pro, then illustrates it with a picture of the new MacBook Pro.
advertising
The 10 Most Reliable Car Brands VS Your Preconceived Notions
By 1.12.09
Consumer Reports just did a study about car brand perceptions, so we thought we’d compare the top 10 most highly perceived brands to their list of the most reliable car brands.
Snuggies And ShamWows Beseige Nation's Cheap Airwaves
By 1.9.09
The economy is ‘sploding so that means it’s infomercial mating season. Prices for airtime are dropping as bigger advertisers pull their spots, so the Billy Mays of the world are now getting slots during 30 Rock commercial breaks. At the same time, more people are watching TV because they don’t have money to go out and it helps anesthetize them to the pain of reality. Thus, the rise of the ShamWow and the Snuggie, a super slurping sponge cloth, and a blanket with arms, respectively. Let’s take a closer look.
Why Do We Make Things That Look Like Other Things?
By 1.5.09
What is this obsession with making products look like other products? 1-800Flowers has a bouquet of white flowers in a special basket so it looks like a cupcake. It’s called, “Cupcake in Bloom.” Then you have those tiny “just for decoration” presents with nothing inside. Discovering these at my grandma’s house as a kid, I first began to truly appreciate the world’s cruelty and caprice. There’s doorstops that are made to look like it’s a little kid reaching up for the doorknob, and pencil sharpeners that look like hotdogs. This trend strikes me as disturbing, even perverted…
Drug Makers Say Goodbye To Swag In 2009
By 12.31.08
Beginning tomorrow morning, drug companies will stop peppering doctors’ offices with branded pens, bandages, tongue depressors, stethoscopes, calipers, mugs, prescription pads, soap dispensers, and t-shirts.
NYT Investigates TV Shrink Ray
By 12.26.08
Is nothing sacred? The New York Times is reporting that the grocery shrink ray, that scourge of the savvy supermarket shopper, has now been turned to televisions.
Staples: Give Us $80, We've Already "Set Up" All The Laptops In Stock…
By 12.22.08
Here’s a “set up fee” or “optimization” complaint we’re seeing more and more involving a wide range of retailers.
Walmart iPhone Poster Spotted In The Wild
By 12.18.08
Consumerist Flickr pool member shakerdesigns spotted this poster for the iPhone at his local Walmart. A recent leaked memo said that Walmart would begin selling the iPhone on Dec. 28th.
Shopping Online Kills Ponies
By 12.18.08
The campaign, titled “Give Your Community a Lift … Shop Locally for Your Gifts!” aims to remind shoppers that local retailers provide local jobs and support community-based civic and charitable organizations. “Many consumers shop online and avoid paying sales tax, and while this may appear to consumers as a way of saving a few dollars, in the end it may cost them more if local tax revenue is eroded and municipalities are forced to cut back on services,” said Michael P. Kercheval, ICSC’s president and CEO.
NASCAR Begs You To Buy More Stuff From Its Sponsors
By 12.10.08
With the potential demise of the Big Three auto companies looming on the horizon and a general exodus of advertisers from sponsorship deals, NASCAR may be in trouble.
Nestle Quik Flipbook Ad On DC Metro Walls Is Kinda Magical
By 12.2.08
As the DC red line train I rode last week shot through a tunnel, a happy brown bunny jumped up and down on the walls, lofting up a bottle of Nestle Quik. It wasn’t a video, it was a series of back-illuminated panels, each one a successive frame in the animated cartoon. It was like running through flipbook in real life. I found a clip of it on YouTube, posted inside, the cartoon starts at 15 seconds in.
Best Buy Really Does Not Want To Let You Buy The Advertised Special
By 11.24.08
Reader John writes in with a story about “upselling” at Best Buy. He saw a TomTom GPS unit for $99.99 on sale at Best Buy, so he headed over to the store to pick one up. What follows is his account of how much trouble it was to actually buy the item. We think we counted 9 times that John had to tell various and sundry Best Buy employees that, yes, he was sure that he didn’t want to buy a slightly more expensive model of the same device.
New York Times, 1908: 100 Years Of Christmas Creep!
By 11.12.08 — Updated: 10.17.13
Reader Annie spotted this early Christmas ad while browsing through the New York Times Machine. It’s from November 11, 1908.
Old Cigarette Ads: Doctors, Nurses, And Rock Hudson Say It's Good For You
By 10.10.08
Man, cigarettes were awesome in the past, if these old ads collected by Stanford University are to be believed. They calmed your nerves so you’d stop humming nervously! They soothed your throat! They made you a movie star and helped you capture animals on your big game hunt! We don’t know what tobacco was made of before the mid-80s, but no wonder everyone smoked.
Lawsuits Claim Applebee's Weight Watchers Food Has Too Much Fat
By 10.10.08
Awhile back we posted about some testing done by a group of local news affiliates that showed that the actual amount of fat (and calories) in certain “healthy” menu items from a variety of restaurants was different than what was listed on the menu.
High Fructose Corn Syrup Research Paid For By HFCS Industry
By 10.1.08
CBS says that they took a look at the research cited by the marketing campaign from the Corn Refiners Association — which features “people-in-the-know” rolling their eyes and scoffing at befuddled anti-corn-syrup zealots — and realized that “three were sponsored by groups that stand to profit from research that promotes HFCS. Two were never published so they’re funding sources are unclear. And one was sponsored by a Dutch foundation that represents the interests of the sugar industry.”
These Pennsylvania Lottery Mascot Costumes Were Poorly Thought Out
By 9.26.08
Quinto is a new lottery game from Pennsylvania, and their mascot is a bunch of fingers, we’re guessing. We can’t figure out how these mascot costumes made it from concept to on-the-street reality, though. We like how the guy in this photo seems to be thinking, “What exactly am I posing with?”
FreeCreditReport Hires Ed McMahon To Rap In "Viral" Videos
By 9.25.08
We’re warning you now, so that you won’t bother to fall for the “you-gotta-see-this!” absurdity of an 85-year-old former talk show announcer and sweepstakes pitchman reduced to self-mockery in order to make some money. We don’t begrudge McMahon his career, but as you know we deeply begrudge “free”creditreport.com for its misleading name, commercials, promises—well, pretty much everything.
