The folks who run New York Senator Kirstin Gillibrand’s campaign have decided that I want, or can be convinced to want, her to win the Democratic nomination for president.
I’ve received dozens of messages from Gillibrand on my Facebook feed, including the one below inviting me to, “Enter to win a whiskey with Kirsten.”
The premise is simple. Send money to help Gillibrand secure the nomination; get entered into a sweepstakes for the chance to have "a whiskey" with the senator. I assume we'll each get our own glass and won't have to share in case one of us has a cold sore.
The ad's secondary objective, without a doubt, is to make Gillibrand out to be someone voters would like to have a drink with and I, for one, would most definitely welcome that opportunity. I'd ask her, while waiting for the bartender to pour our drinks (make mine a Maker's Mark on the rocks) why she, a lawyer, doesn't believe in due process because she led the charge to force Al Franken, a senator who actually accomplished something, to resign without so much as a hearing. But I digress.
As an advertising professional, I find the headline uninspiring. Why didn’t the writer use alliteration to add interest? “Win a Kalhua with Kirsten." "Win a Kamikaze with Kirsten." Or (ideal for Utah where a substantial percentage of voters are Mormon teetotalers), “Win a Kool-Aid with Kirsten."
The ad makes sense only to those who know Gillibrand bragged that whiskey is her beverage of choice, as if that is a reason for anyone but Jack Daniels stakeholders to vote for her.
I thought Gillibrand's advertising couldn’t get any dumber until two days ago when I saw the ad at the top of this column, inviting me to “Chip in $1, Get a Free T-Shirt.” Apparently Gillibrand needs 130,000 individual donors to contribute at least $1 in order to qualify for the next round of Democratic debates, so some marketing whiz came up with the idea of offering a shirt to every contributor.
There are so many things wrong with the ad that I hardly know where to begin.
For starters, it is deceptive. The t-shirt isn’t free. You have to give at least $1 to get it.
And there’s an economic issue here. There isn’t a third-world sweatshop that can produce a two-color screened t-shirt and ship it to America for $1. Not to mention, the campaign has to pay someone to put each shirt in an envelope, address it, and pay the postage.
Knowing something about t-shirts -- I produced tens of thousands in my agency days -- I’d have to guess each shirt is costing the campaign at least $4.50 to put in the mail, probably more. If everybody who orders one contributes just $1, they’re going to lose a load of money.
I contributed $1 immediately, and received two emails. One told me to expect my t-shirt in six to eight weeks. The second asked if I would consider increasing my contribution. I deleted it.
Today I received a follow-up message asking me to reconsider the amount of my contribution. I wrote back. “No."
It gets dumber. Although I first saw the ad two days ago (and my son did too, because we laughed about it), it is still showing up on my Facebook feed. Gillibrand's social media experts know I clicked through, contributed money, and they should have instructed Facebook to stop showing it to me because every time it appears, they have to pay Facebook a fee. Surely by now, at least 130,000 Facebook users have figured out they can get a shirt worth at least $4.50 for $1 and, if they support one of her opponents, help drive Gillibrand's campaign into bankruptcy. Are Gillibrand's advisors even keeping tabs on how many shirts they have promised to send, and how much money they will have to shell out? Clearly, the senator and her advisors have no understanding of basic economics, much less marketing.
Whatever, I’m looking forward to my new t-shirt, which should be arriving soon.
The rag I use to scrub my grill is saturated with so much grease I'm afraid to put it in the washing machine.
This will be the perfect replacement.
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