I came across this post in the summer and at the time I thought it was absolutely and ridiculously hilarious. I didn’t realize how genius these companies were until I started my education in Sauder. We recently learned about the the “Gains and Pains” of different customer segments and how companies can find ways to relieve those pains while creating gains. Brilliant Companies like Qtips, McDonalds, AXE and many more companies have successfully created products to relieve pains that “manly-men” face with products such as:
Qtips- Men’s Ultimate Multi-Tool
McDonalds- Sausageness-Baconess-Manliness
AXE- Detailer, apparently men are cars now?
Absolute horrid and painful pains that only manly men face, such as pains that come along with using regular Qtips, eating regular burgers and using regular loofahs.
Honestly, I can’t tell if this is brilliant or if this is completely ridiculous. From a business perspective, this is genius! Being able to target a narrow customer segment and cater to their needs while making money is BRILLIANT. However, from my rather “equality-for-all” perspective, this type of marketing is sending our society decades into the past.
We’re taking one step forward, and one hundred steps back by continuing to buy products that are specific to genders when in reality, most, if not all products don’t need to be separated. (How ironic, coming from a business student.) This argument is the same for products targeted to males just as much as it does to females, for example:
Gilette Venus
Bic- for Her
Equality for all burgers. Equality for all pens.
Equality for all.
(Disclaimer : My intent is not to insult anyone, but rather point out some of the satires in our society.)
(Edit: Check out Hafu’s response to this post! http://blogs.ubc.ca/hafu/2015/11/09/buying-manliness/)
source: http://www.buzzfeed.com/lukebailey/masculinity-is-strong-and-powerful#.vaOKGBNzL
photo sources:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CGMLoynWIAI3eWE.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CEpi8FuWgAAJz5p.jpg