Adelia, a grown women in her 50s, was eating Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes for breakfast.
Her 30-year-old daughter (who was visiting for the holidays) came down and observed her mother eating this food.
She looked at her mother, then looked back at the box of cereal. The expression on her face said it all: “You’re really eating that?”
“I used to eat Frosted Flakes when I was a kid,” Adelia said, as if reminiscing.
Her daughter nodded. She touched her chin, looked down at the floor. “I used to crawl under the kitchen table and eat baby food peaches when I was 3.”
They both laughed.
“I remember that! You were so cute!” the mother said.
“It would be weird if I ate baby food peaches today,” the daughter replied.
This story snippet illustrates a concept that instantly adds awareness. Some adults are still eating the same foods they ate as a child — not even questioning their choices.
By the time a person is around 5 or 6, they’ve pretty much formed most of their core viewpoints on life. They rarely, if ever change.
Fifty years later, a person can act roughly the same as how they acted as a five-year-old.
Feeling the same insecurities they felt as a five-year-old…
Throwing roughly the same tantrums they threw as a five-year-old…
And yes, eating the same breakfast they ate as a five-year-old.
In Adelia’s case, she was a grown woman eating Frosted Flakes. Eating the way a child would. And she was perfectly OK with that.
Her daughter’s comment demonstrates the silliness of that fact, by comparing it to her own self: it would be utterly ridiculous if she, a 30-year-old woman, crawled under the table today and ate baby food peaches like she did at age 3.
It’s hard to stay the same after you’ve been exposed to a good story or metaphor. It sits with you, percolating in the back of your mind.
Metaphors, analogies, visceral bits of language, and stories administer a little shock to the nervous system – the way that jumping into a cold body of water would.
Most people don’t carry awareness or take the time to get perspective around the food they eat, the things they swallow (pills, prescription drugs, etc.), or the stuff they eat via their skin (lotions, cosmetics, beauty products, etc.).
This lack of awareness is one of the greatest challenges organic companies face. But it also represents a huge opportunity.
The main marketing responsibility of an organic product company is to create awareness without using the actual cliché word, “awareness.”
Use stories and metaphors to jolt people into thinking more deeply about their everyday actions and behaviors. Force them to see what they’re doing, in a new light.
Force them to become aware that some of the actions they’re taking today are similar to actions they took as a child – which are no longer appropriate now that they’re an adult.
Michelle Lopez is a writer, editor, and copywriter with a BA in English/Creative Writing from the University of Colorado at Boulder.