Stupidest marketing ploy EVAR.

The weirdest thing happened to me yesterday. I'm leaving my house for the first time that day, and as I turn to lock the deadbolt, I see something hanging on my doorknob. Sure, you'd expect a flyer or some other kind of advertisement. Even a "do not disturb" sign would have been less of a shock. You know what I find hanging on my doorknob?

Tuna.

That's right. Tuna.

Well, it's not JUST tuna, it's tuna in a vacuum sealed pouch; it's not like delinquent kids just smeared it on my door. So I look around, half expecting to find some twit wandering around with a pouch full of fish, distributing it to various households, but this tuna ninja was obviously too stealthy for me.

I'm not exactly the world's biggest tuna fan. I mean, the least they could have done is provided me with some Miracle Whip to go along with it. Remember that peanut butter/jelly mixture that they used to sell? I'm thinking pre-mixed tuna and mayonnaise is the next big thing.

It's not as if I asked for this tuna-from-heaven and if a company suddenly had a large surplus of it's food stuffs, I can think of much better uses for it. What genius says, "Hey, we have millions of pouches of non-perishable, vaccum-sealed fish. I know what we can do! We can hang these on all the doorknobs in our great land." Well that immediately cuts out the segment of the population who would probably most appreciate a free food sample. You can't hang anything on the doorknobs of people who don't have doorknobs.

Why not send it to a country in need of aid and get a nice tax break for your charity? I wonder if they thought about the fact they they probably offended many families of vegetarians, people who own fish, or those wackos in those weird fish-worshipping religions. I know that I'm not more apt to buy tuna in a pouch than a can. The only advantage you get is not having to drain it. I'm near enough to a can opener to get inside a can of tuna, then chances are I'm close enough to a sink to empty out the liquid.

Handing out samples in the grocery store like every other product would have been just fine. It would have been just as successful at getting me to switch brands, which is to say, not at all. If the powers that be want me to buy more tuna, they should start giving me more value for my money...like including free DVDs or Episode II action figures.

Get with the program.

Originally posted on Monday, 2002-06-03 at 10:12:37.