Don’t Shoot The Messenger

Christmas is a coming, and the goose is getting fat. Or is it really a goose? This is the time of the year when you will see products advertised that you will never see again; enjoy them and savour the inanity of printed marshmallows and yet another online greeting cards company with a name with a surreal prefix/animal combination. Really, enjoy them, because they won’t be around next year. And herein lies the quandary: if the products are so obviously ephemeral, should marketers get involved with those which are just designed to generate fad cash? Of course they should.

I agree; marketing a catch-penny will leave any marketer with even the smallest of consciences feeling a little uncomfortable. But there a couple of things here that are worth pointing out. Firstly, marketers have a living to earn, just like everyone else. But the other thing is more important: marketers are not in a position to make moral judgements. We are not in a position to say what the public can or cannot (or should or should not) have. 

One of the most important features in our modern society, for all its faults, is the fact that we can still make choices for ourselves. If a marketer turns their back on a product – providing of course it is legal, decent and honest, it is a) depriving potentially the public of choice, and b) futile, as the client will just find another marketer who will take the brief.

For those of you still wringing their hands and lamenting the amoral nature of the marketing industry, consider this: even those who commit the most heinous crimes have a defence lawyer. And I for one would argue that persuading the public to buy this year's flavour of snake oil is more palatable than defending any one of those who have committed the most dreadful acts. Don’t shoot the messenger. If you feel that strongly about it, just don’t buy the product.