A branch of psychology McVities Moments - image from www.snackspot.co.uk
“This was not to say that Laurence knew how to bake, though he grew swiftly defensive in response to my expression of surprise at his inability. Biscuits are nowadays a branch of psychology, not cooking, he advised sternly.
Laurence had forumulated his biscuit by gathering some interviewees in a hotel in Slough and, over a week, questioning them about their lives, in an attempt to tease out of them certain emotional longings that could subsequently be elaborated into the organising principles behind a new product. In a conference room in the Thames Riviera hotel, a number of low-income mothers had spoken of their yearning for sympathy, affection and what Laurence termed simply, with aphoristic brevity, ‘me-time’. The Moment set out to suggest itself as a plausible solution to their predicament.
While the idea of answering psychological yearnings with dough might seem daunting, Laurence explained that in the hands of an experienced branding expert, decisions about width, shape, coating packaging and name can furnish a biscuit with a personality as subtly and appropriately nuanced as that of a protagonist of a great novel.”
From The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work, by Alain de Botton.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Laurence explained that…an experienced branding expert can furnish a biscuit with a personality as subtly and appropriately nuanced as that of a protagonist of a great novel.
It was at this point I really started to miss Bill Hicks.
http://sennoma.net/main/edits/Hicks.html
Sorry, but it’s the wrong choice for me. Mr Darcy always and forever, no contest. But, pose the alternative – Chocolate Biscuit vs immature, sulky, possibly grumpy bf? Biscuit – everytime
It’s a pretty basic branding exercise. Most marketers leverage sweets as comfort food for those emotionally bereft moments. Hence products with names such as KrispyKreme/Golden Gaytime
and offer competitions where you win tickets to chick flix & tear-jerkers. Now that the public are cottoning on to this, they’re blaming marketers for the rise in obesity. But really, how vulnerable are we to the power of suggestion? Comfort food is not a invention of Madison Avenue or otherwise.