Off-Target

Speaking as someone who spent a good deal of his marketing communications career producing television commercials and promos, I have to say that Target really missed the mark in one of their recent ads.

Take a look:



The only thing that troubled me more than the idea of someone pitching this idea, was the idea that someone at Target responded with “Wow, looks great! Let's get this on the air!”

Is offending a sizable portion of your audience really the wisest marketing move? I would think that the package of cardboard or paperboard, colored paper, craft supplies, flashlights, etc. needed to hand-craft a costume could easily approach, equal, or in a few cases even surpass the price to be paid for some ready-made Halloween costumes. The ideal message would be that, whether you want a deluxe ready-to-wear costume or to create your own, you can find everything you need . . . at Target.

If nothing else, did not the ongoing economic downturn give anyone in their marketing department pause for thought? I would think that home-made costumes may be the preferred option for budget conscious households for the next few years. And despite ever-evolving gender-roles in contemporary society, I would think that mothers are still quite often the deciders when determining shopping destinations for their households.

A forward-thinking organization might look even further, to tap into large, but perhaps less-than obvious markets that are ripe for expansion.

A lot of parents are expressing outrage in online forums, regarding the message it sends about spending time with your kids, crass mass-market consumerism, and more. Does it bother me as a father? Sure, it does. It bothers me a lot as a marketing communications professional.

By the way, wasn't the original Iron Man suit hand-made?