MCMARKETING: WHEN YOU'RE HOT YOU'RE HOT

WHEN YOU'RE HOT YOU'RE HOT: WEIRD SIGNS IN THE COFFEE

How to land on your feet after a marketing crisis? After losing the infamous spilled hot coffee case in the landmark 1995 lawsuit Liebeck v. McDonald’s Restaurants, McDonald's (and just about every company serving coffee) added a warning label to its coffee cups. A few years ago that warning was something to the effect of "Caution: the beverage you are about to drink is very hot".

This morning I was sipping my McDonald's coffee and staring bleary eyed at the photos of the young, hip, gorgeous boy and girl on the cup. A little warning light flickered in my sleepy brain...that light that sometimes goes on at the moment of market manipulation. There it was in black and white, the warning had transformed to "Caution: I'm Hot" with tiny inset lettering stating "Handle with Care".

Maybe they paid another $2.9 million to the marketing genius who came up with that one. It's a warning, it's a (not so) subliminal message. "I love this coffee", I thought to myself, and "I'm so hot"!

Speaking of the creepy aspects of marketing, read a book recently by my pal William Gibson (at least he feels like an old friend) Pattern Recognition. The hilarious thing about this novel is that Gibson has conceived of a character who has a phobia—of brand names!!! Could he have written the whole novel tongue in cheek? Unfortunately this is not a great novel, but it definitely is a great outline of a novel.

CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?

Stayed at the Sheraton Grand in Sacramento last week. I haven't followed the Americans for Disabilities Act too closely, but I have noticed that hotel rooms have continued to add more and more signage for the hearing impaired. One sign for the fire alarms that always catches my eye says "alarm sounds like whoop". I can't figure that one out because if you have never heard a whoop how would you understand that? and if you have, but cannot hear now (thus needing to read the sign) how would you know there is a sound?

In any case, this time at the Sheraton I noticed that the TV remote control bore a sign which read:

"CLOSED CAPTIONS PRESS MUTE"

Whoever came up with that one ought to go back to the drawing board!

CLAUSTROPHOBIA ANYONE?

Claustrophobia Anyone? - Weird Elevator Signs

As a person with a, shall we say, "dark" sense of humor, I have, over the years, taken for granted my creative imagination. So it gave me pause, to say the least, when I read a sign in the elevator that speculated horrors even I had not considered. The sign reads "There is little danger of running out of air or of this elevator dropping uncontrollably":

I read this thought provoking sign every time I ride the elevator at my apartment--yet every single time I read it I have the same thought--LITTLE danger?