Get the Pauly started with Baskin-Robbins!*

Aka, how to cheapen a brand. It’s a get your non-stop ice cream freak on party with DJ Pauly on Facebook. Free download with purchase!** This is part of what I do. Suggest “promotional tie-ins across media channels that integrate social networks” and so forth. (I didn’t do this one, relax.)

Ice cream though, well, tends to be a family event. Get in the car, head down to (insert place of choice). Everyone’s happy and dad’s out about $10 plus gas. Smiles ensue!

I can also see the brand’s perspective and their desire to reach a wider audience beyond that demo where they live (online). After all, kids don’t always like hanging with parents after a certain age. And maybe even that high school to college crowd appeared attractive to them.

How to reach... how to reach...

JERSEY SHORE IS HOT RIGHT NOW, LET’S DO THAT!

Not seeing it makes sense because of that family vibe though. Popularity having merged with notoriety long ago, the brand clearly went for what was hot right now, not necessarily who was right for them.

That’s part of the consumer dynamic of being a customer these days.

While we *seem* to have more choices when it comes to who we buy from, no brand is perfect. If they do something we like, well, we’ll just switch then! Maybe, but while switching on principle may be the noble thing to do, where do you draw the line? Who’s to say the brand you want to switch to won’t turn around and do something you disagree with?

Then you have to switch again, and so on. What’s left to turn to at that point when you run out of choices?

Some issues are truly serious ones to consider switching brands over, and Pauly may be a non-issue in the bigger picture here for many. But consider the trainwreck by association that he’s a part of (especially the legal ones), and I’m not sure he’s my first choice in the presentation deck to represent what the brand is about.

Baskin-Robbins has a good product. Is it Coldstone? No. But, it’s good enough for what it is. Will I stop buying it over this? No. Does Pauly deserve to make a living? Everyone does.

I just think a little less of the brand now for using anyone from this insane clown posse.

*I only wish they would’ve gone with that line—woulda made the dream complete.

**Umm, then it’s not free.