Keri Smith is an award-winning commercial illustrator with ‘kewl’ publications (
Tear Up This Book), and thought-provoking concepts about creativity and life experiments (“wear only one color week”). In a nut shell, those are her ‘public’ brand characteristics that represent her uniqueness and success in the industry.
However, Keri is at a point in her life where she wants to accomplish something bigger but has the risk of jeopardizing her commercial career. Her somewhat life transformation includes support for an
Ad-Free Blog and she states comments such as “buy nothing new for a year”, where such motives contradict her commercial profession.
Her introspection has lead her to question the beliefs of corporations. These days, consumers, the public in general, are not only interested in product purchases, but also want to determine the ethics of corporations behind those products and whether to support that company or not.
To what extent can we carry on such an exercise? Perhaps life is too short and/or limiting to be questioning these things (?), and can we really arrive at the truth to a corporation’s indubitable motives—which is a great exercise in epistemology?
I think we can only arrive at the public, surface policy of corporations and then choose to side with them or not. It would be an arduous task to determine the true personalities of the CEO down to the VPs in order to arrive at our conclusion.
Keri’s courageous adages struck a cord in me as I have purchased her product and am willing to purchase more, yet, somehow, attempting to discern whether to subscribe to her brand of philosophy. That’s the role of a responsible consumer.
Despite not agreeing with her complete stance on marketing, I support her honesty. And, mostly, her graciousness in taking the time to reply to my rather lengthy e-mail questioning and criticizing her stance. Hope she follows up with more ‘kewl’ products.
Each day, it seems, marketers go further in their quest to deliver messages so engaging and personalized that one cannot help feeling special. The latest step will be seen today in four cities when Mini USA begins delivering custom messages to Mini Cooper owners on digital signs the company calls “talking” billboards.
