Due to our ever-increasing need to reward ourselves, coupled with our perpetual attempts to escape stress, we are turning to the small luxuries and comforts of this world. Welcome to the “premiumization” of America.
Premiumization, although hard to pronounce the first 50 times, is a reality that will be hitting hard in 2008. Regular stuff is just not cutting it anymore. We deserve better than the run of the mill bottled water. We need bottle water with bling, by golly! New to stores this year folks, is the Bling H2O bottled water, complete with studded Swarovski crystals. In this case, it is just packaging that gets the royal treatment—the water is nothing special. For those not satisfied with the aqua status quo, you will be paying up the wazoo. It’s like Indiana Jones and the Rainforest of Doom—you will be bidding on water that was caught as it falls, never touching the ground. It’s called Tasmanian Rain, a new product from Australia, in which the claim is that the water has NEVER touched the ground. Yah, sure it hasn’t. They have little Tasmanian devils running around in a thunderstorm trying to catch rain in little bottles.
Premium toilet paper, which comes in black, blue, gold, and well, again do we really care about the color of our toilet paper? It might as well be the color of money, cuz that is what is getting flushed down the toilet.
Premium coffee, premium tea, premium chocolate, the list goes on and on. Watch for this trend to continue throughout this year and buyer beware, because it’s a lot of hogwash. With all this premium stuff coming out of the woodwork, manufacturers and vendors are telling us that they’ve been holding back the “good stuff” all these years! Excuse me? All this time, I was drinking filthy water, crappy coffee, tea with cooties and chocolate that was found under a rock!?
In addition, all these restaurant chains are introducing their “premium” menu. “Try our Premium chicken sandwich, made with real white meat!” Well, what the heck was I eating before? Mystery Fowl sandwich made with possum (the other, other white meat)? “Try our new premium salad with real iceberg lettuce and buttermilk ranch!” Well what was wrong with the dumpster lettuce with stale mayonnaise? Did the blue cheese just move?
I feel a little insulted that these premium items are popping up all over now. It is just another marketing ploy to get people to buy more stuff for more money and to fatten up the manufacturer’s margins. I don’t want bling in my water, blue toilet paper and jewel-encrusted chicken salads. If you try to sell me a chocolate truffle that was made with cocoa only found on Neptune or Mars, I’ll tell you to send it to Uranus. (Alternate ending: If you try to sell me a chocolate truffle made with gold dust and silver flakes, don’t bother, unless you have some premium milk from a premium cow, which ate premium hay and blah, blah, blah….
No comments:
Post a Comment