I like to analyze TV commercials.  Sort of weird I guess…but there are some companies that generally have eye-catching and entertaining commercials along with a noteworthy message.  Some commercials catch your eye, but I don’t really notice the message or company name.  Other companies have a strong message, but it is a boring presentation.

I like the new Bud Light commercials with the paintball battle…too light…to heavy.  I enjoy paintball and could have used the fighter jet support more than once. 

I also like the commercials for Southwest Airlines.  The new commercial has the tough looking crew looking sad as they wave goodbye to the bags.  Or, they make the jingle with the phrase “bags fly free” repeating over and over.  I like the message and I find it entertaining.  They are believable commercials too…the actors really look like folks I see moving bags on and off the jets.
 

The parallel message of the commercial struck me just the other day.  I mean, basically they are reminding folks that when you buy airline tickets you need to look at the whole price…not just the advertised price.  They say it in a pleasant and entertaining way, but the message is, “Hey y’all, don’t be fooled by our competitors’ low advertising pricing because they don’t include baggage fees.”  The folks at Southwest feel that it is necessary to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to tell us this.  They must be losing customers to their competition.

It reminds me of the pricing complexities here at Trophy Awards.  From time to time we shop the competition to check-out their pricing.  There are some competitors who advertise lower pricing on similar items.  How can this be?  Well, as I read further or type-in hypothetical text, I see the pricing start to shoot-up.  Yesterday, I noticed a company where 40 characters are included in the price of an acrylic award.  Oh, and if you want your logo etched on the acrylic award, there is an additional charge for that too.
 

When you look at the details, the Trophy Awards value far exceeds our competition.   You see, our acrylic awards include a standard amount of wording.  We don’t have a formulaic count, but it is safe to say that our acrylic includes 40-words not 40-letters of text.  We also don’t charge logo fees. 

I wish I had Southwest’s marketing budget so I could run some eye-catching, and entertaining commercials with a strong message.  We could make up a song that says, “logos etch free” or “wording is free”.   I don’t want to lose customers to our competitors who simply advertise a really low price knowing the final product will cost a bundle more.
 

My message today is fundamentally the same as Southwest’s…”please shop carefully, and don’t be misled by deceptive pricing tricks.”