Saturday, April 2, 2011

Extreme Brand Loyalty








There’s no shortage of companies offering discounts or cash for their customers’ undying loyalty and Ecko has just joined the game. Are you still wearing Ecko? Are you still paying full price for it? If you answered yes to those questions, you’re an idiot and, being an idiot, you obviously haven’t heard of Ecko’s Branded For Life campaign.
You're dying to run out and get one, aren't you? Great. You have two choices:
Crappy rhino or crappy skull scissors. Choose wisely!

Now, it does say permanent but it doesn’t say what size it has to be so, if someone's dumb enough to get this tattoo, I can only hope they’d be smart enough to find a tattoo artist with a steady hand and a magnifying glass so they can get it really, really tiny. And if they're not that smart, I don't know how they haven't gotten hit by a car yet. 
You could simply take advantage of this offer on the Ecko website:

Wait... 15% off and you don't even have to get a tattoo? But if you get the tattoo, you get 20% off for your whole life! That means when you’re in a wheelchair, you can still get funky, urban t-shirts that look like a junkie snorted second-rate urban culture up his nose and blew it on a piece of fabric. Sweet, right?
Mark Ecko must have been smoking something pretty potent at the board meeting to bring this up.
MARK – (takes a huge bong hit) Hey! Let’s get people to tattoo our logo on themselves!
ADVISOR – But Mark, our logos suck. Why would they do that?
MARK – We’ll give them a discount on our shitty clothes!
ADVISOR – I guess you’re right. There must be people who are dumb enough to a) wear Ecko for the rest of their life and b) get a tattoo to prove it.
MARK – (Eats entire cheese tray.)
But would you regret the tattoo? Will your tastes change? Will you grow up one day and stop wearing unnecessarily long, baggy shirts and ball caps with a straight brim, sticker and price tag still intact? Will you ever stop looking like a juvenile douchebag? 

But 20% off isn’t even that much (JC Penney gives you 15% off just for being a student, no tattoos necessary.) 20% off means, instead of $19.50, you only pay $15.60 for this god-awful piece of shit.
What a privilege! And check out this gem:
 "Hey look! My tattoo looks like badass scissors. And, in case you can’t see my tattoo, don’t worry; I’m wearing the same badass scissors on my shirt! And it only cost me $15.60."
Considering the fact that you’re not only advertising for a company, but also permanently branding yourself with their logo, shouldn’t they be paying you for that? Not only are they making you pay to advertise for their company on your body, but you still have to pay for their merchandise." “We’ll make you pay us less for our clothes,” doesn’t exactly translate to, “You are making a profit from us.” Quite the opposite, but anyone getting an Ecko tattoo doesn’t need to be told that (because they don’t comprehend complete sentences.)
At this point, if you’re still considering getting the tattoo, take a look at the fine print:
Employees are not eligible to participate in this promotion.

Does that mean current or future employees? Who’s to say I don’t get the tattoo now and find a job with Ecko in 10 years? Will they pay to remove the tattoo?
Tattoo must be permanent. 

A caveat to this should be that the company must remain in business for as long as you have your tattoo. Hear that, Ecko? If an 18-year old kid gets a tattoo and he lives to be 80, you have to stay in business for another 62 years. That sucks for you, but that really sucks for me and everyone else who’s forced to wear or see your shitty clothes in public.
Cannot be combined with any other offers.

Are you kidding? If I get a permanent tattoo of your logo, you’d better believe I’d be taking advantage of any and all offers your company has. I’d hate to have this kind of conversation at the counter:
CLERK – Oh sorry, we know you permanently tattooed our logo on your skin as a sign of loyalty, but the 20% off doesn’t apply to the buy one, get one free skateboard shorts promotion.
ME - But I got the tattoo.
CLERK - We know. You’re a fucking idiot.
ME – (Eats entire cheese tray.)
Is this brand loyalty or the height of human stupidity? I’m leaning towards the latter.
Enjoy your crappy t-shirts.

1 comment:

  1. NICE! Hahahaaa. Only ecko piece I ever bought was a heavy duty sweater in 2000 that I swear was a great piece of clothing. It didn't look like someone had vomited a design on it, but rather looked like a simple heavy-duty charcoal ecko sweater..... Jager.

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