I took my son and daughter along to the local Meijer grocery store today (it’s a Midwestern grocery chain for those of you in other parts of the country). Spent about 45 minutes picking up various things and headed to checkout.
So I end up in a checkout aisle that has an endcap designed to have children begging parents to make that one last additional purchase. On a peg board they had nine vertical slots of different merchandise — but the combination of merchandise was a bit surprising.
The first 8 slots were all devoted to Crayola merchandise. Brightly colored boxes of markers, crayons, that clay substitute Crayola makes, etc. The very last slot was a multicolored product as well, but it wasn’t a Crayola product — it was packages of blue, red, etc. Bic lighters.
So I’m sitting there thing what sort of idiot would create a display targeting kids with Crayola products and then put Bic lighters in the mix. Because I really want my daughter to associate Bic products with Crayola products (and I’m certain the Crayola folks would be just as thrilled by such a combination).