W is for WACKAGING in the Z-A alphabet of anti-marketing!

Having negotiated the choppy waters of X,Y and Z, we have now reached the calm ocean... and the letter W in the weird, wacky, wonderful Z-A of anti-marketing.

W is for Wackaging.

Yes, wackaging (wacky packaging)! This increasingly irritating concept hit our streets back in 1999 and has not gone away. The Innocent drinks company were to blame for this extremely novel bit of anti-marketing where the product actually talks to the customer. Yes... talks. Well, not exactly talks out loud but certainly chats to you in a (hopefully) informative, non-confrontational and humorous way. Products all jostled to be your best friend in the trolley. At the start, it was considered zany, clever and funny, but customers have very short tempers when it comes to mucking about with them in the supermarket aisles and, by the mid-noughties, wackaging was either being phased out or changing to something a little different. Light, inoffensive information came along, tucked around the soft banter on the packaging.

And that's Wackaging - silly, daft, clever and a novel anti-marketing. It's not really selling the product, but more trying to strike up a direct relationship with the weary shopper. This is a gambit that works reasonably well at the start but fizzles out rather quickly.

W is also for WALKING AWAY! Yes, it's that great marketing tactic of just walking away from a salesman upon hearing the price. But... but... but... most sellers will drop immediately straight to their knees nowadays in COVID Britain gushing tears and begging you to stay and talk more, immediately offering 'unexpectedly' great discounts. So, not really a clever anti-tactic at all. Just the standard way of reducing a seller to suicide.

And that's the weird, wonderful world of the letter W in anti-marketing! And, if you want any more of this sort of madness you should tap here - to a book which will talk to you in all sorts of ways and make you chuckle a few times too. But please don't walk away after seeing the price - I'm sure we can come to some agreement. Pleeeeease!