Article

2006-09-03 -Short Attention Span Theater-

He Sliced and Diced His Way Into Pop Culture

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Posted by Fred 2006-09-03 00:00|| || Front Page|| [1 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 A Ginsu knife could cut anything; the famous ad shows the cutlery tearing through a tin can

Although that's what the voice over said, it was a lie. The commercial actually had to retract and re-record that particular little line.

What the knife was really cutting through on-screen was an aluminum beverage can and not a food storage can, something that would have blunted a Ginsu knife in seconds or less.

Without Schiff, American kitsch would be poorer

Perhaps so for this nation's kitsch, but Americans would be a lot richer had this huckster never been born. Schiff and his idiot-bastard-child, Ron Popiel, helped usher in an era of marketing based upon "perceived value". If IBM or AT&T ever attempted to devote the amount of money Ronco spent on television advertising time, their executives would instantly be fired.

By purchasing massive blocks of inexpensive late-night programming time, Ronco projected themselves as a manufacturing powerhouse. Popular perception ran as follows; "If they can afford these lengthy and expensive commercials, they must really have a dynamite product." This is the basis of perceived value. A triumph of style over substance, the credo of our age.

Dynamite products they were not. In fact, exactly the opposite was true. Ronco products were designed with paper-thin tolerances and materials that would outlast the warantee by milliseconds, on a good day. Shipping and handling often exceeded the actual purchased item's value and commonly represented a separate and highly profitable revenue stream all of its own.

Schiff is probably responsible for a solid 10% of our non-decomposing landfills. The items sold could not be serviced or repaired nor were they durable goods in any sense of the word. The black eye given to honest entrepreneurial spirit and true capitalism will last far longer than any other legacy that Schiff has left to us.

How do I know this? I worked, very briefly, for one of the vacuum packaging food storage product marketing firms. Their goods were essentially aquarium pumps with a high school diploma. The advertised marketing claims involved serious misrepresentation of fact. Most frightening of all; If production became backlogged, all they had to do was decrease how often the informercial ran. If sales dragged, merely upping the infomercial airtime was all it took.

We are talking about sales entirely driven by marketing and not a thing to do with quality or cost effectiveness. This is the pinnacle of perceived quality and it represents the nadir of quality engineering and everything that is wrong with today's planned obsolescence goods. Whenever you see a label that reads, "NO USED SERVICEABLE PARTS INSIDE", remember to thank Arthur Schiff.

Posted by Zenster 2006-09-03 00:51|| 2006-09-03 00:51|| Front Page Top

#2 Of course, that should read:

Whenever you see a label that reads, "NO USER SERVICEABLE PARTS INSIDE", remember to thank Arthur Schiff.

Posted by Zenster 2006-09-03 00:55|| 2006-09-03 00:55|| Front Page Top

#3 Infomercials are my guilty pleasure. The next round's on me at the O club in Art's memory...daiquiris whipped up in my Magic Bullet, of course.

Posted by Seafarious">Seafarious 2006-09-03 01:11|| 2006-09-03 01:11|| Front Page Top

#4 Speaking of saving money, in search of immediate air-conditioning relief I made the mistake of sitting in a movie theater, while Nicholas Cage's remake of "The Wicker Man" was playing. Not only is it poorly acted junk, a Feminazi plot was grafted over the original story of present day Paganism. The "Stepford Wives" was protested by Feminists. Unfortunately, there is no such thing as a Masculinist.

Save your money and your lunch by avoiding this emitic waste of time. Thumbs way, way, way down.

Posted by Snease Shaiting3550 2006-09-03 01:47|| 2006-09-03 01:47|| Front Page Top

#5 Art was a god to us studying Bizzz Addders, including Marketing Management, at university. Sigh, GLEN FORD has also passed - one of my favs when Hollywood was Hollywood, NOT Holly weird.

Posted by JosephMendiola 2006-09-03 01:53|| 2006-09-03 01:53|| Front Page Top

#6 ZenMan you SOB Ron Popeil is me Hero! I'm tempted to snatch you bald headed with a my pocket-fisherman. I'd just put that hook on your noggin and

SET IT AND FORGET IT!

Posted by 6 2006-09-03 05:28|| 2006-09-03 05:28|| Front Page Top

#7 Meh ... I usually have to pay extra for that.

Posted by Zenster 2006-09-03 06:03|| 2006-09-03 06:03|| Front Page Top

#8 The next round's on me at the O club in Art's memory...daiquiris whipped up in my Magic Bullet, of course.

I know people who swear by the Magic Bullet.

Posted by Robert Crawford">Robert Crawford 2006-09-03 09:01|| http://www.kloognome.com/]">[http://www.kloognome.com/] 2006-09-03 09:01|| Front Page Top

#9 I still have Mom's Veg-O-Matic. The sucker actually works.

Posted by Mike 2006-09-03 09:41|| 2006-09-03 09:41|| Front Page Top

#10 is that a fishing rod in your pocket or...

Posted by Frank G">Frank G 2006-09-03 10:07|| 2006-09-03 10:07|| Front Page Top

#11 Seriously, Zen I'd rather live in a society where Schiff can push his junk and people can buy it -- and expose it in blogs, as necessary -- than in a society in which some people decide what is appropriate to build and sell, and how.

Haven't met yet the person I want to run the world him/herself. It's messier our way, but overall it has some significant advantages.

Posted by lotp 2006-09-03 10:22|| 2006-09-03 10:22|| Front Page Top

#12 Now now, I could do very nice job running the world ...

Posted by Steve White">Steve White 2006-09-03 11:05|| 2006-09-03 11:05|| Front Page Top

#13 Well, maybe us mods could do a decent job. ;-)

Posted by lotp 2006-09-03 11:34|| 2006-09-03 11:34|| Front Page Top

#14

Steve White: Now now, I could do very nice job running the world ...

lotp: Well, maybe us mods could do a decent job. ;-)

yep now SINK TRAP yourselves for even thinking such a thought!~!

"MODS: NO USER SERVICEABLE PARTS INSIDE"

Posted by RD 2006-09-03 12:39|| 2006-09-03 12:39|| Front Page Top

#15 »:-)

Posted by Ginsu 2006-09-03 13:17|| 2006-09-03 13:17|| Front Page Top

#16 Now now, I could do very nice job running the world ...

I like the way you think, Steve. It's a dirty job but somebody's got to do it.

My post in no way replies that Schiff should never have been allowed to go to market with his shoddy crap. Only that such tripe accustoms the consumer to getting less than their money's worth and dulls any awareness of what actual quality is.

I am an inveterate thrift shop junkie. Why? I find that goods manufactured over 30 to 50 years ago are incredibly more durable and well-built than the plastic muck spewn forth today. My kitchen is full of expensive French Le Creuset cookware, all discarded by yuppies who inherited their parents' homes, that I then bought for bare pennies on the dollar. They can have their ridiculously overpriced Caphalon, I'll take enameled cast iron any day.

I buy cast iron skillets for $3.⁰⁰ and fine vegetable dyed Mexican serapes for $5.⁰⁰. Old metal-bodied Dremel tools, complete with steel tool box, plus arbors and bits for a whopping $10.⁰⁰. You couldn't pry this stuff out of my hands unless you waved a $100.⁰⁰ bill in my face.

Keep your electricity guzzling Ronco George Forman grill. I'll use a Wagner cast iron comal on my O'Keefe & Merritt gas range.

Posted by Zenster 2006-09-03 13:36|| 2006-09-03 13:36|| Front Page Top

#17 My mother-in-law is now in an assisted living facility. I have my eye on her old toaster, which had been her mom's. Has the wire-reinforced fabric-wrapped cord and takes wide bread. ;-)

Good catch on that Dremel! Dremels with sandpaper bands are THE way to trim dogs' nails, by the way. Once you accustom the dog to it it's fast, easy and if you accidently go a little into the quick it heat-seals the wound immediately. Basically puts weeks of nails being worn down if the dog were living in the wild and concentrates it into a 2 minute grooming effort.

If you've got a dog and he or you hate doing nails, this will change it for you. No pain, no pressure on the sensitive quick, just a short session with the ol' Dremel and they're good to go. I do mine with the dogs on my lap on the couch or the easy chair. They fight for who gets to go first to get the cuddling and tolerate the nails as the price of admission. ;-)

Posted by lotp 2006-09-03 13:52|| 2006-09-03 13:52|| Front Page Top

#18 lotp, thanx for the dremel info wrt dog nails. My dobie has really long nails and a long quick. Normal exercise only reduces them a little. Cutting her nails has been a pain (literally and figuratively). I'm going to try the dremel.

Posted by Broadhead6 2006-09-03 14:23|| 2006-09-03 14:23|| Front Page Top

#19 In Japan the hand can be used as a knife

Posted by Ginsu 2006-09-03 22:08|| 2006-09-03 22:08|| Front Page Top

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