How would you like a new orgasmic illuminator?

They’re on sale round the corner. Really. I’m not kidding.

You probably thought all agitated, thinking I had sunk to flogging something you get in porn shops, didn’t you?

But there’s a place round the corner from me on the Kings Road in Chelsea where they sell overpriced cosmetics, and that’s what it is. I don’t know in what way it’s better than the old orgasmic illuminator I’ve been using, but it made me think about the unfairness of life. To be honest, I don’t care if my orgasms light up – I’m quite happy however they arrive – but some industries, like cosmetics get away with the most outrageous promises, and others can’t even tell the truth.

For instance the other day someone either died or was seriously injured (can’t remember which) as a result of some treatment they got from one of those Chinese herbal medicine places that have sprung up like toadstools all over the country.

However, the prosecution collapsed because there are no rules for these places. Why? If a doctor did anything like that he’d be in immediate trouble. Is there no law against fraud? Is there something special about these wily rogues that gives them immunity. Or is it, as I suspect, yet another case of one PC rule for all of us and another for anyone not actually born here?

I spend a lot of time writing stuff in the financial field, and you can’t get away with anything even vaguely suspect because of the ogre known as Compliance. Practically all large organisations have their Compliance departments, pullulating pools of negativism staffed by petty bureaucrats whose main task is to justify their existence.

They drive the good people in the marketing departments crazy. It generally takes far longer to get agreement from “compliance” than to write the copy and create the layout. Last year we did a job where two large organisations were doing a joint promotion. It never ran because after a month or two of wrangling the compliance departments couldn’t agree. We’re doing one now that took me less than a day to write and has taken up weeks with silly questions.

In Shanghai they told me the Chinese compliance rules are very simple. “Work hard today or tomorrow there will be no work.”One explanation why their economy is growing and ours is shrinking.

There is no compliance on the internet, on which the messages never cease to amaze me. The latest scam is one that says the tax people have got a refund for you. Chance’d be a fine thing. My favourite message today is one that reads “this video from Tellman kicked me in the hiney!” Clearly aimed at the intellectual wing of the business fraternity. Any fool who falls for that deserves to get what’s coming.

About the Author

In 2003, the Chartered Institute of Marketing named Drayton one of 50 living individuals who have shaped today’s marketing.

He has worked in 55 countries with many of the world’s greatest brands. These include American Express, Audi, Bentley, British Airways, Cisco, Columbia Business School, Deutsche Post, Ford, IBM, McKinsey, Mercedes, Microsoft, Nestle, Philips, Procter & Gamble, Toyota, Unilever, Visa and Volkswagen.

Drayton has helped sell everything from Airbus planes to Peppa Pig. His book, Commonsense Direct and Digital Marketing, out in 17 languages, has been the UK’s best seller on the subject every year since 1982. He has also run his own businesses in the U.K., Portugal and Malaysia.

He was a main board member of the Ogilvy Group, a founding member of the Superbrands Organisation, one of the first eight Honorary Fellows of the Institute of Direct Marketing and one of the first three people named to the Hall of Fame of the Direct Marketing Association of India. He has also been given Lifetime Achievement Awards by the Caples Organisation in New York and Early To Rise in Florida.

5 Comments

  1. According to the groundbreaking 2003 medical report Death by Medicine, by Drs. Gary Null, Carolyn Dean, Martin Feldman, Debora Rasio and Dorothy Smith, 783,936 people in the United States die every year from conventional medicine mistakes.

    But thankfully no tigers or rhinos were injured in the process.

  2. These stats may be slightly closer to Planet Earth; an article from The Daily Telegraph so it must be true. A 'safety patient incident' is a bad thing and you should avoid one if you see it coming.

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    Of course, some people are going to hospital because they actually do have a hole in their head.

  3. draytonbird

    How hilarious, Glyn — unless you're feeling a bit off

  4. I'm always feeling a bit off.
    This hospital stuff is disturbing especially as I have just done a short stretch in the Royal Lancaster Infirmary and had serious metalwork added to my leg by a bloke who got a new Black & Decker and an economy size box of screws for Christmas.

  5. That is the “further 22 died due to abuse by … visitors”

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