raving lunacy - oxymorons for the 21st century

Recycle, Reuse, Reduce. Noble stirring words for a planet on the brink of the latest castastrophe. And fodder for PR sausage machines.

“now made with 100% post-consumer recycled HDPE.
HDPE is non-toxic and Bisphenol A and Phthalate free.”

I don’t know which annoys me more, the quacking of companies who offer you green guilt free products, or the folks who describe them.

Environmental Deficit Disorder is a term I made up for the practice of over packaging products, by companies who should know better.

My personal EDD story is the Canon Ink Package. This package contains only 3 cartridges. It would seem that I am not alone in thinking that this is a stupid idea. On a tip from the Dell Blog is this gem from the Register. 17 boxes to protect 32 A4 sheets

Can’t quite figure it out. Is this a printer company problem in that their profits on ink are so vast, that environmental concerns are out the window, or is it just stone cold stupid?

EDD stands for Environmental Deficit Disorder.You heard it here first! EDD.
I have been recycling since before a lot of folks could pronounce it, let alone understand it. I worked in auto junkyards for almost 9 years, which may account in small part my sparkling personality, but more importantly exposed me to recycling in a big way,(when you are crushing dismantling and crushing 5 cars a day,about 10 tons of scrap metal, 6 days a week for two years, you build up a bit of a carbon credit) as well as networking, as auto wreckers have telephone hotlines that connect each other together to find parts for customers.
Great sales training also, as you have a vertical sales challenge. You are selling used parts from wrecked cars to folks who are pissed off because their cars are not working, they cannot afford to buy new, and they do not know how to install it.
Couple of years of this, I can sell your sister back to you, and have you thank me. But I digress…

In the post global warming, save mother earth, go Green or Die Brave New World, there are a couple of things that annoy me. Packaging is a big one. I have already saved the planet enough.
Specifically Canon Printer ink packaging. This is a Canon Color Ink cartridge bought at Costco. It has a shrink wrap to hold the orange cap in place.

So you are thinking WTF? here is the package it comes in.

You are thinking WTF? It is a value pack! Says so right on the front.

This is the back side. There are 3 cartridges only. One of each color The package is huge in relationship to the product.

This is  Environmental Deficit Disorder, of the first rank. Canon is not alone in this. It is just the stuff I use.

I am not buying an anti theft argument, as just about anywhere that sells printer ink, keeps behind the counter, or under lock and key, and then holds it for you on your way to the register, like you can’t be trusted not to make a break for the door to the getaway car piloted by your office assistant.

Getting the package open is an exercise in danger also. You need a blade sharp enough to cut through plastic thick enough to be used as bulletproofing, yet not so sharp that you end up slitting your wrists, or that of your trusty henchmen. You have already generated this big pile of garbage, arguably recyclable, before you ever get to actually use the ink.

Really what the hell are these folks thinking. You had me at the first photo. I like my printer, and want to use it, rather than dealing with a package designed by some deranged designer who didn’t make the cut for reality TV. I would like to buy them 6 of one at a time also.

Next up is Polident 5 3 min. denture cleaning tabs. Yes it is a bulk pack. But they individually wrap them, leaving more crap to dispose of.

They could package them in little plastic tubes like Alka Seltzer used to come in. EDD for sure.

The Ready Kilowatt Guilt Trip
The electric company ads that say if everybody in America replaced just one bulb with a CFL, it would save enough energy to power every home in Arizona.(probably have the same ad in your state, but I live in Arizona) and my bill has not gone down, leading me to the conclusion that the rest of you are red zone, suv drivin’, planet raping fools of the first order. Maybe you have and my bill will go down next month. Yeah Right!

Don’t get me started about what an environmental disaster that the mercury in CFL’s are going to cause in a few years. The good news is that places like the Home Depot are accepting used ones for recycling. As well they should, thinking back to the Asbestos litigation of a few years ago.

So there you have it! Another acronym you can use in your next conversation or round of golf.

Having Upgraded to WP2.5.1 I have regained control of the Media Library(stupid fuckin name), which gives me the ability to post photos. A deal breaker in my world.
I may have mentioned that in my world the top things (in order) that bring me pleasure are sex, movies and remodeling.
Since remodeling has become my day job, I am not getting any, and my movie jones is moving along, I decided that I needed to build some cases for my collection, which is getting relatively large. Last DVD count was somewhere in the neighborhood of 500 discs. Yes I buy my movies.

Tuesday is New Release Day across the US, and recently I have switched to Best Buy as the low price leader. Cheaper than Target or Wal-Mart. And it hurts me to give Best Buy any sort of attaboy. However back to the cases…

What is available commercially, made out of particle board and shelf paper is not worth the time to buy and use. Just like the so called ‘computer desks’ designed by idiots whose closest encounter with computers consists of those cardboard boxes that are printed to look like computers.

Being handy with tools and having built version 2 of the New Temporary Workshop, I designed and built the Serious DVD Case.

This case is a bit shy of 24” wide, 82 1/2” high and 6” deep. Using 1 sheet of 18mm-3/4” 7 or 9 ply plywood and one sheet of 5/16” sanded ply, yields enough parts for two cases, with very little waste.

This unit has 9 shelves, which holds 324 clamshell DVD Cases.

The openings between the shelves are a 1/4” taller than the case, and shelves a 1/2” narrower than the case, for fingertip action and dust control.

I am in the process of building a home theatre as well.

Compact Fluorescent Lights contain a small amount of Mercury. They may save energy, but they do require a little common sense in using.

Here is an interesting tidbit about research into Mercury toxicity done in the Amazon.
Mercury Research Bears Fruit in the Amazon: International Development Research Centre

In the world of marketing, advertising, and public relations, you work for somebody else. That is what those folks do. Traditionally their job is to take a product, shine it up, and cram it into your brain. Marketers could care less about product, as their job is to sell illusions, starting with the management and ending with the accounting department who cuts their checks. Success is measured in units, bought by consumers.

The Internet has changed the rules of the game, giving the people formerly known as consumers, a voice that can be heard around the world. Folks are gonna buy stuff, but their choices are larger, and are more inclined to shop with companies who care what customers want, rather than being a ‘unit’ ‘consumer’. It really sucks to be in the marketing game nowadays. When the best you can do is the number of cup holders your product has as its unique selling proposition, you may want to seek other career opportunities. When some company signs off on this nonsense, you should look for a different product.

Seth Godin is a marketer and author who works for himself. He has a different view on marketing. This morning he posted this:

”Perhaps the biggest change the new marketing brings is the easiest to overlook, mostly because it’s so obvious.”

”Every organization now has the ability (and probably the responsibility) to deal directly with the world. With customers, with prospects and with those impacted by their actions. No middlemen.”
Read the rest of it.

Companies who heed this advice will prosper. Companies who continue down the middleman path and outsource their marketing and products will end up in the ‘product sucks’ listings on search engines and may very well end up on the latest product recall lists.

If you embrace your customers, they will sell your products, and will let you know when there is a problem. They will be happier and you will be a stronger company for it. But if you want to continue down the middleman path, know this, there is a company that sells what you sell, that does care and will get our money.

Weeds - Season One Mary Louise Parker is astounding.

If you never inhaled, this is probably not the show for you. If you did, this is funnier than hell.

This is one of the bastard paper plastic cases. It contains two dvd’s, that could have been slipped into a simple clamshell.

\
Cheap slipcase for this season seems to be a waste of time. Plus this edition is full screen rather than wide screen. Major suckage there. The blurb in the pocket on the left is an episode guide.
Weeds - Season One

Back in the 90’s, when personal computing was starting to make inroads into our lives, software came on CD’s, in big boxes that you bought at the computer stores. For you youngins’ this was before online downloads, when having a 14.4 modems made you the geek of the week. Everyone of these products came in a cereal sized box that opened differently than every other one. They all had a jewel case holding the CD, and the box was more of an intelligence test than the contents were.

VCR Tapes on the other hand had a constant size and package. DVD’s have arrived to replace tapes, There was a brief interval with a crossbreed paper plastic case, but a stake was driven into it’s heart. The standard DVD package is a plastic clam-shell containing a circle holding your movie and maybe some weird blurb sheet. Straightforward, consistent packaging. Holds 1, 2 or 3 DVD’s. With the arrival of TV Series on DVD, we have been thrown under the bus again, by either the return from the dead zombie bad package designers, or their hell spawn possessed get.

The resurrection of bad package design

Multi DVD sets present challenges, between the desire to package them for the lowest possible cost of production, vs the desire to embellish the cases with information about the contents, maybe an ad for other series, and simple things like disc numbers.

Some of these folks are having a problem with the idea that this is one of the areas where the contents are much more important than the package. You had us at the cash register.

This has led to some interesting (in the sense of the chinese curse) formats and packages. (this is one of those places where recycled plastic could be very big in the holder) It has also led to the return of the paper/plastic halfbreed. The photos are by yours truly, so they may not have that vaseline glass, no blemish look, but I think you will get the idea. I also have a link to Amazon in case you want to get your own copies:) (yet another stab of becoming filthy rich online by selling stuff to get you offline.)

Here in no particular order are some series and the design choices made.

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House, M.D. - Season Three is the third season on DVD.House stars Hugh Laurie as a diagnostician in a New Jersey regional hospital whe runs a department that takes on cases that the rest of the staff can’t solve.House is a cranky bastard whose bedside manner is nonexistent, has his own health issues, and his staff gets run through the wringer of his intelligence and dry wit. If you are looking for kittens, butterflies and rainbows, you will be sorely disappointed.It is one of the few highlights of commercial television in a desert of clone reality and what will you do for money shows.

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Season Three comes on a Flip flop, double stack, open top and bottom sleeve package.

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I hate double stacking. The chances for damage go up, and it is a PITA to juggle the discs when you are settling in for some serious viewing.
House, M.D. - Season Three Highly Recommended.

I have been reading paperback books for many years. I learned to read with Gothic Novels, and Hard Boiled Detective Fiction like Mickey Spillane, John D. McDonald, and others. Times were much simpler with Mike Hammer on the Job.

I Discovered Science Fiction and am still addicted to this day. I almost stopped reading in the early 21st century as publishers kept putting out fantasy and clogging up the racks for the Hard Science fiction fans. You can only kill so many dragons, rescue the damsel, and stop evil. Basically gothic novels with wizards, magic and no bodice ripping, or pulsing thighs.

Enough of my twisted reading habits. The paperback book industry has lost their way or they have been blackmailed by the VCR shelving manufacturers lobby.

Exhibit 1
On the left is a ’standard’ paperback. In the center is a ’standard’ VCR Tape. On the right is a new paperback. Specially Designed for Comfortable Reading.
Specially Designed my ass. They have taller pages, wider margins, words spaced farther apart, yielding less words per line, making them thicker, and using more paper and being heavier. The ink smears real easy also.

Coincidentally, they just happen to be the same size as a VCR tape. Hmmmn. It could be a conspiracy to re-use all that tooling left over from the days of VCR tapes… The good news, is I don’t think they will gain a lot of traction. The bad news is that there will probably hundreds of NewBook furniture designs arriving soon.

Hersheys Brownies - Triple Chocolate Chunk is a product for brownie and chocolate junkies. Most of you have probably not seen these in your grocery aisles, unless you shop at Costco or Sam’s Club. Membership has its privileges. These are almost obscene in their flavor.
Mini Kisses, Semi Sweet and Milk Chocolate chunks, wrapped in brownie. These are good enough to get you to get your own Membership, even if you will never buy toilet paper 36 or 48 rolls at a time, or case lots of other things. Has 6 Pouches inside. Enough about what’s in the box, this is about what is on the box, and in the box. This is bad packaging at its peak. First, despite the glamor of the cover shot, one thing that manufacturers forget is what folks do when they get the product home. We put it in the cabinets, on edge, sideways. We do not have the shelf space for full frontal displays of products. Secondly, some folks pull the stuff out of the box and put it on the shelf that way.

Over on my Product Blog, most folks agree that these are the best brownies around, the largest commentary revolves around the damn directions. They are on the back of the box in an awkward location and arraignment. Somebody went to the trouble of posting the directions in the comments and the disturbance in the force has been quelled.
However this gets up to the heart of the current rant. This is a shot of one of the 6 pouches that come in the box.
How hard would it be to put the directions on the Pouch???? It is not. There is enough room for the directions, Nutrition block, and the toll free number! No it need not be in four color, or even two, the logo translates quite well, and the directions being on the pouch will make folks a lot happier, especially those folks who actually buy Betty Crocker or Hershey Products.

How hard would it be to put the directions on the side panel, where the majority of boxed products end up and are displayed in cabinets everywhere? Not hard at all. Plus you can do the full color thing.

Oh yeah, they could cut down the box by 2 inches in height as well. The box is one of the toughest packages in cardboard, and it’s not like a corner ding is going to ruin the product.