I’m often awestruck by the utter cluelessness I see in some of the marketing strategies of the indoor tanning industry. A case in point is my neighborhood chain store tanning salon, which is called “Tan Your Hide”. Really. All I can think about when seeing that name is the process of treating skins of animals to produce leather. And, of course, brown leather production is exactly what their frequent customers are doing, although I’d imagine that’s not what the salon owners intended to suggest when naming these stores. Their advertising slogan is “it’s time to get your glow back”. And since radiation therapy no doubt lies in the futures of some of their repeat customers, I guess these losers of the tanning bed lottery will someday be ‘getting their glow back’ in a way they’d never quite imagined. Although, once again, I sort of doubt that’s the kind of “glow” the chain’s advertising agency wanted prospective customers to think of when coining this ironic slogan.
With heartfelt gratitude to the indoor tanning industry for supplying me with such rich material for yet another blog post, I’ll sign off with the Hotel Melanoma version of The Beatles’ “Don’t Let Me Down”…
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Don't let me brown, don't let me brown.
Don't let me brown, don't let me brown.
Nobody ever bugged me like C do me,
Ooh C do me, yeah C does.
And if somebody ever really bugged me,
Ooh C'd bug me, yeah C does.
Don't let me brown, don't let me brown.
Don't let me brown, don't let me brown.
I've been drugged for the worst time.
Don't you know it's gonna last.
It's a drug that lasts forever,
It's a drug that has to last.
Don't let me brown, don't let me brown.
Don't let me brown, don't let me brown.
And from the first time that C really done me,
Ooh C done me, C done me good.
I guess nobody ever really done me,
Ooh like C done me, C done me good.
Don't let me brown, don't let me brown, please.
Don't let me brown, don't let me brown, please.
Ow! Don't let me brown
Don't let me brown
(Can you dig it?)
Don't let me brown.
"tan your hide" = ick. The "got vitamin d" campaigns drive me the craziest. There is a huge billboard of that near my house. grrr.
ReplyDeleteThat's just odd, even in my tanning days something like "tan your hide" definitely wouldn't get my business! I did get a nice little "tan" from radiation though, 8 months later I can still see the tan lines on a corner of my back. The vitamin D thing is also pretty absurd, in a world where people live on fast food and don't exercise, I find it funny that very many people would be so concerned about vitamin D!
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