how did i know that school was going to give me an avenue to be sarcastic and combative? i didn’t or else i’d have come back to school a LONG time ago! school is awesome! i love being contrary and really, you can only be contrary for so long with the same people day in and day out. school allows me to be the other side of the argument for 8 weeks which is just enough time for my classmates and professors to figure out that most of the time i’m arguing just for the sake of arguing and then class is done and i go on to the next set of victims….(insert evil laugh here!)
anyway, i am currently taking a class in consumer behavior and this is the paper i turned in to my new unaware professor when asking us to rate an ad campaign on Leggs.com….poor professor…
“On Leggs.com I see several women being portrayed as happy, slender and without a care in the world. My personal values couldn’t be farther from that. I am living in the real world. These women look like someone who could have a career, family, work out, see friends and have a balanced life BUT that’s not realistic.
I think this site portrays women as inattentive, oblivious and completely rooted in some fantasy world where everyone wears a little black dress, has great legs and smiles all the time.
I think the site shows women in an inferior role because they obviously don’t need to be concerned with anything concrete or of any substance. Have great legs and the world is your oyster. What is the L’eggs jingle…”Nothing beats a great pair of legs!” Hmmm, what about 10% unemployment or a recession or people committing suicide because their once successful lives as stockbrokers is now pretty empty and meaningless.
The marketers of L’eggs should most definitely be more aware of the world we live in today and the role women play in that world. Women are not sitting on the sidelines shaving and wearing panty hose and smiling left and right without a care in the world. They are scrambling and scraping and worrying as much as the next person about what is happening to their world right now.
If it was as easy as putting on a pair of L’eggs panty hose and my life would magically be perfec,t I’d be throwing my laptop aside and RUNNING to the nearest Walgreen’s for some L’eggs right now.
That, however, is NOT the case and I am not running to buy the product from a company who apparently does not live in the world that everyone else lives in. BUT how can you blame L’eggs? They want to sell something positive and happy. Who wants to buy hose from Chicken Little who yells “the sky is falling; the sky is falling!” Is it better to be honest and unprofitable and still be employed or is it better to sell your soul, “bend” the truth and be able to pay your bills?
I think L’eggs has definitely fallen into the pitfalls of selling to women. We are ruled by emotion and we like happy, pretty things; not ugly problems. We are content to deal with surface issues. Let the men handle the conditions of substance; we have laundry to attend to!
This is most definitely an example of low culture because L’eggs is hoping to appeal to the masses not the educated minority. High culture would be an example of something that more closely relates to art or fine literature. A L’eggs ad most certainly does not fall into that category nor do the majority of their consumers. They want to be the happy women who are flying though life not having a problem or want ever. They want the fantasy that L’eggs is selling. In this economic environment, who doesn’t want to put their head into the sand? Wake up when times are prosperous and you can stop worrying abut your hose selection but for now…forward the e-mail that will get you your wish at 8:27 tomorrow morning AND wear L’eggs panty hose. Can’t hurt, can it?”
now you know…don’t tell my prof…later…
