[Advertise in This Space]

How much am I advertised at?

Well, right now I know I’m wearing Wrangler jeans. They tell me so on the big leather label on the back. I like these jeans. They’re sturdy and comfortable. My Lee jeans, however, less so. So when it’s a Wrangler jeans week, I’m happier.

There’s lots of product packaging in the home. When I go to the pantry, I can see Diet Pepsi, Dr. Pepper, Calidad brand tortilla chips, Life Cereal, Hy-Top soups, all sorts of things. Same in the bathroom.

And on the road. Lots of billboards and signs to read. And lots of advertising, too, on that Information Superhighway.

So that’s a lot. And I don’t even watch television or have a physical newspaper in the house – traditional avenues of advertising – though I do get plenty of advertising in the form of book blurbs and such on the printed matter I do read.

Morgan Spurlock, evidently, wants to find out how much we’re advertised at. And how much advertising we’ll tolerate (answer, way too much).

I’m not sure he’s necessarily saying advertising is good or evil – it’s just there, part of our accepted landscape. Maybe it’s getting more pernicious, and maybe you could say money is wasted on it – but I’m not convinced it’s advertising that drives us to make every purchase we make.

I bought the Wrangler jeans because they were my size, on sale at an outlet. I might go back and buy more Wranglers if I see them there again not because they’re wranglers, but because they feel good. But I’ll keep on trying other pants, on the hope I find something better.

We bought our Honda Pilot because we knew the former owner – my father-in-law – and because the financing plan – 0 percent API, again thanks to my father-in-law – couldn’t be beat.

So watch for an interesting turn at the end of this talk, when in an only slightly backhanded way, he praises the companies that agreed to sponsor his new film by agreeing to take the risk in turning over their brand to him, at least for this film. It’s one I want to see.