Non-sequitur claims bug me. There is a radio ad on now that goes something like this:
“Have you lost money in the stock market, or are you looking for ways to preserve capital? Then you should know that gold and silver are the only private investments available today.”
Okay, say I have lost money in the market (who hasn’t) - how does that tidbit of knowledge about gold and silver help me? Will my stock market losses magically reappear now that I know that gold and silver are the only private investments available today? That’s even assuming that it’s factually accurate. which I doubt.
A couple of months ago, Clorox was running a TV commercial touting the fact that the Clorox bottle says “kills germs” on it, while cheaper generic bleaches do not say “kills germs” on their bottles. I haven’t seen this commercial in a while – I’m guessing that the FTC had a little talk with the Clorox people.
I’ve actually gotten one in the mail that was for several thousand dollars. I remember I kept looking at it and reading everything it came with, trying to figure out who sent me a check like that and for what reason. I was just too suspicious to accept that I was getting free money for nothing. I finally saw the small print that said if you cashed it, it meant you accepted the loan. That pissed me off, not because I might have fallen for it (I’m too cynical for that) but because there are a lot of people who probably did.
My favorite deceptive practice is mislabeled and/or vague price tags on shelves. I know, people sometimes put stuff back in the wrong place, but I’ve been to many stores that don’t change their tags after a sale. I get to the register, and the price is wrong. When I mention it, I’m told that the item has since gone off sale. I’ve had more than a few talks with managers about this. (So far, Wal-Mart has been the only company that will consistently admit their mistakes and they will generally honor the sale price if the tag is old.)
A local car dealership put “Voted #1*!!” on their billboards. It was only on much closer inspection could you read “*by Team Chevrolet employees” in the fine print. They voted themselves the top car dealership. :wally
Any cute kid or teenager who comes to the door of my house and starts the sales pitch with some sort of statement like, “Do you support getting kids off drugs and off the streets?”
I generally refuse to buy anything sold door to door, especially by minors. It’s very dangerous (and annoying) and buying their products (or magazine subscriptions) just encourages them to do it more.
There is a work-out program that is sold on infomercials called The Firm. I should mention that I use it and it does work, but it bothers me that it claims visible results in 10 workouts or less without clarifying that those 10 workouts should be fairly close together as opposed to over the period of a year. Not that I thought otherwise, but I could think of any number of people who might.
Our local grocery store frequently runs “buy one, get one free” sales. The only problem is that they double the price on the first item. People actually fall for this. :rolleyes:
Pharmaceutical companies are paying celebrities, like Lauren Bacall, to appear on newsmagazine shows, telling stories about their own or a friend’s medical problems. At some point during the story , they happen to mention this wonderful new treatment (manufactured by guess who?). Apparently, the news shows are unaware of the arrangement, so they’re off the hook ethically, but there has to be some kind of rule against this. Doesn’t there?
I hate those subscription cards that fall out of magazines. There’s always, like, SIX of them and when you think you’ve got them all disposed of–out pops another!
I also hate those magazine “articles” that are not articles at all, just full page advertisements that are made to look as though they are real, journalistic articles.
You see this at the end of every damn fast food advertisement ever. Now… I know that they are franchises, and that they may not be able to force every store to do it, but the end result is that I just watched an advertisement for a new product that may or may not exist, which featured prominently a price which may have no relation at all to what the local store is charging for it.
So… tell me again what you were advertising? I already know that (your brand of) fast food exists. Yet, that’s the only useful information I was able to glean from this advertisement.
This one is for one of those “call for help” systems for the elderly. You wear the emergency button on a bracelet or pendant, and if you are injured, you push the button and help comes. Useful, I’m sure.
On this particular ad, a doctor (or at least, someone in a white lab coat) tells us the harrowing tale of his own elderly mother, who fell in the shower at her home and wasn’t discovered until 20 hours later. Of course, because she didn’t receive help quickly, her recovery was long and painful.
But then I think: Would she really have been wearing that magic button device in the shower, or even put it somewhere she could reach if she fell? Sounds like your emergency-call system wouldn’t have made a lick of difference, Doc.
Junk mail which arrives in a manila-colored envelope similar to those which contain Federal checks. Through the window it appears to be a check there too. The effect is heightened by some legal-sounding script like “Postmaster: if undeliverable, handle in accordance with USPS reg. 154.22” or some such which is probably a guideline for trashing junk mail.
You will also be informed of the section of the US criminal code governing tampering with the mails. Sounds very official.
Here’s what you do with those cards: Drop them in a mailbox.
The advertising company only has to pay postage for the ones that get mailed to them, whether you put any information on them or not. If everybody mailed the blank forms back to them, it would become massively unprofitable, so they’d switch to something cheaper, like popup ads on websites.
Of all the diets, gimmicks and excercise equipment advertised on TV, The Firm is probably the least offensive and deceptive. Upfront they admit that you gotta sweat and work to lose weight and that means they seperate themsevles from 99% of the other weight loss TV stuff right there.
The “10 workouts” things is pretty minor compared to the “3 minutes a day” stunt pulled by others.