Sunday, June 3, 2012
Oh yeah Staples, this is a totally believable ad
1. What does "Computer Broke" mean? That's certainly the first question I would ask if I were "IT Mom." Does it mean you knocked it off the table? You picked up a virus trying to get around the filters to look at porn? You spilled milk all over the keyboard? The internet is down? What?
2. Has anyone, anywhere, ever uttered the words "Mom, Computer's Broke?" First of all, isn't it safe to assume that any kid between the ages of 6 and 16 knows two thousand times more about computers than any mom aged 35 and up? Isn't a kid asking an adult for help with the computer kind of like an adult asking a kid "did you notice where I put the warranty for the new washing machine?"
3. IT Mom has quit, because now there's Staples. Which means that while IT Mom has quit, Made of Money Mom is still on the job. Which I'm sure is just fine with the kids, since the computer was more than a year old and therefore hopelessly out of date anyway and really lame anyway.
4. Tell me this isn't a commercial letting kids know how they can get a brand new computer out of Made of Money But Clueless When It Comes To Technology Mom in about fifteen minutes flat. "Hey Mom, Computer's broke- and here's the car keys and your purse, meet you in the Caravan." Well played, Staples.
*btw, I almost didn't even notice that this is Totally Absent Dad Mom Does Absolutely Everything When It Comes To The Family Ad # 987,435. Not only does it no longer faze me when a commercial allegedly featuring a "family" does not show a man old enough to be married to the featured Mom, but I really don't even expect to see him anymore. I mean, these are commercials, not sitcoms. If they were sitcoms, Dad would be an essential part of the picture, there to look and say something really, really stupid for Mom to roll her eyes at and kids to snark on. (In the slightly longer version of this ad, he's probably revealed as the guy who "broke" the computer. Stupid dad!)
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I'll tell you what else is 'broken' here: my willingness to shop at a store that makes ads like this. I knew we were in trouble when they started running Christmas carols for their back-to-school thing but this is just beyond the pale.
ReplyDelete2. Has anyone, anywhere, ever uttered the words "Mom, Computer's Broke?" First of all, isn't it safe to assume that any kid between the ages of 6 and 16 knows two thousand times more about computers than any mom aged 35 and up? Isn't a kid asking an adult for help with the computer kind of like an adult asking a kid "did you notice where I put the warranty for the new washing machine?"
ReplyDeleteNo. Computers are easy to use normally, but when they start to crash you have to go beyond clearly marked buttons and into the code. Code can be pages of gibberish even to a real IT, and amatuers shouldn't touch it at all.
Aside from that, how does IT Mom quit. The only explanation is a truly weird cloned/polygamist society, because you don't just lose your entire knowledge of a certain field like that.
Good points, but I still say that the last person a kid goes to for help when "the computer's broke" is a parent- unless, of course, they just want that parent to fork over for a new computer.
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