Following the Kwik-E-Mart 7/11 story I started snooping around for other Simpson related marketing tactics and asked myself the question: why doesn't anyone fret about the fact that our yellow friends are being exploited by all kinds of corporate icons all over the globe? I'm a pretty big fan myself and I don't really seem to bother either...
I mean, just follow up on all the different activities here, the Kwik-E-Mart in Seven Eleven (follow up on this blog), it all looks fantastic, even though some of the stuff is just really clever promotional stuff (check out their destination guide on the same page). And then there's this YouTube film which I can imagine being claimed in the following days or weeks:
The answer probably lies withing their family: none of the Simpsons (apart from Lisa, and even she can have her moments) were ever ashamed to let themselves be used if there was any fame, money, reputation, status,... to be gained.
And in that way they are much like modern consumers: we know Google probably has more data on us than we keep ourselves, we know advertising is paying for media, we willingly pay a premium for products which create a compelling story around themselves. And while we know all that, rationally, we let our hearts, our fantasies, our emotions take over when shop, read, listen, travel,...
I don't think there ever was a group of media characters who reflected our own lives so well (the sheer volume of the series helps out here), there's a bit of us in every Simpson and a bit of Simpson in everyone of us, and that's probably why they can get away with this kind of stuff.
Imagine what they get in return and ask yourselves if you would turn down the deal...
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