Aesop and the Kitchen

WHEN TRYING TO break new ground with kitchen
and household promotions, distributors may be well-served to recall the classic children’s fable about the country mouse and the city mouse. To briefly summarize, the story features two mice each unable to tolerate the other’s habitat. The city mouse cannot bear the simplicity of the country mouse’s diet, and the country mouse is horrified by the constant dangers of the city.

So, to apply the lessons of the fable, it’s important to consider end-users’ comfort zones and give them products they’ll actually like. Choose garden tools for the country mouse, a martini set for the city mouse and maybe a travel mug to help make the suburban mouse’s* long commute seem not so long.

*To be included in the yet-unpublished Promo Marketing Fable Collection, Volume 1.

COUNTRY LIVING

A rural-home setting is likely to conjure a wide variety of mental images, but in relation to kitchen and household items, one is certainly ubiquitous: the idea of a home-cooked meal. Whether it is an apple pie cooling on a windowsill, or a fresh batch of chocolate-chip cookies, those who cook make an excellent market for items themed around the kitchen.

Michael Moore, executive vice president of sales for Lakeville, Massachusetts-based Bay State Specialty Company, said, “The thing about kitchen products is that we have a very emotional attachment to our kitchen. If you think about the space, we start there in the morning, we end there in the evening. Whenever we have parties or groups of people in our house, we always congregate around the kitchen.” He continued, saying the emotional connection to the kitchen would carry over to the cookware involved. “Every time you pull that product out of the drawer or the cabinet, you’re really getting very high exposure for very little cost. I’m talking advertising-dollar wise,” said Moore. The best items then, for the cooking-inclined country mouse, would be something used near-daily, like a trusty knife or spatula.