Anyone catch the revised Ace Hardware jingle. They changed the original “Ace is the place with the helpful hardware man” by removing “man” and inserting “folks”.
Political correctness run-amok or is it time for a change? What say you?
A couple of years ago John Madden was waddling through an Ace ad with the tagline “Ace is the place with the helpful hardware man” when a woman in a vest came up to him, helpfully pointing out, “And woman!”
Definitely not a knee-jerk thing.
It been like that for years around here. The first time I heard it, I was a little put-off, but I have to admit it’s more technically correct. The store near me is about evenly split on men and women, and the women aren’t tied to the registers anymore.
Well, going further back, they replaced Connie Stevens and Suzanne Somers with. . . John Madden!
Attempting to care…attempting…attempting…
Attempt to care failed. Please reboot brain.
We’re not going to start hearing a shrill sounding “Oh, Culligan Person!” commercial now, are we?
Between the two hardware stores I’ve been to in town (one of them Ace), I’ve seen about 20-30 employees. I don’t recall exactly, but there might have been one man among them. Based on my experience, it’d be just fine to change the jingle to “helpful hardware woman”.
I wouldn’t call it PC run amok. I would call it realizing that men are not their entire target audience and adjusting their advertising to reflect that.
My years in ad writing tell me it just doesn’t flow right. Jingle writers tell me they prefer to end jingles – especially sig lines – with a dental sound (d,n,t & l). The “k” in “folks” is too hard a consonant that close to the end, and “s” is death as an ending to a jingle. Not nearly as bad with a spoken signature line, but still not optimal. Corporate needs to shut the hell up and listen to the ad agency. Women who actually do business with Ace don’t object to “helpful hardware man.” Now, Home Depot shoppers, on the other hand …
Nobody does it like Sara Lee.? …doesn’t like Sara Lee?
Head On, apply directly to the forehead?
Helpful Hardware Folks?
The only people more annoying than advertising ‘folks’ are traffic engineers.
NOTE: /dev/brain is 95% full. Please delete any useless information you can. 
Kinda my feelings. If you have to cave to PC pressure then change the whole jingle into something that works.
Ace is the place with the helpful hardware face?
I’m 22, and I don’t ever remember hearing “…helpful hardware man.” It’s always been “folks” to me. And in my experience in Ace stores, it could just as easily have been “woman.”
To be exact:
Everybody doesn’t like something
But nobody doesn’t like Sara Lee!
I remember when they changed “man” to “folks.” It was years and years ago. This is not a recent change.
I was bothered at first, but I got over it. As has been mentioned, hardware store employees are not exclusively men. Plus, “hardware man” is not some traditional job title, like policeman or fireman. Still, I agree that this is a clunky and inelegant solution, and they should have thought up a whole new jingle.
Nobody does-n’t like
molt-en bor-on!
Helpful hardware horde?
Helpful hardware brood?
Ditto, completely, down to the age. It’s been “hardware folks” for as long as I can remember.
Not that it really matters, since I can’t remember ever actually buying anything at Ace Hardware. Farm’n’Fleet, Fish, and Menards, sure. But Ace? Never.
Pinning this on the demon PC is quite possibly one of the lamest misuses of the concept ever. It is in fact possible to make something, be it jingle or Congress, gender-inclusive without the demon PC being the motive. And since as many others have noted the jingle’s been changed for a decade or more without your having noticed, describing it as “run-amok” [sic] is ridiculous.