If Holidays Didn't Exist ... Retailers Would Invent Them

Holidays are wonderful retail opportunities.  Would you ever really think to get Aunt Matilda a gift if there wasn't an occasion that prompted your action?  Would you think to take your assistant out to lunch if there wasn't an "Administrative Assistants Day"?  Marketers have long understood the law of physics that says "a body at rest tends to stay at rest."  The same is true for good intentions.  Good intentions need a stimulus for action ... and that's where holidays often come in.

And that's why retailers have taken over holidays like Christmas and Valentines Day, which have their origins in religion or popular culture, but have become major retail events.  That's also why retailers have invented holidays like Administrative Assistant Day and Bosses Day. 

Of course, some retail events are more plausible than others.  Santa Claus has been associated with gifts for decades if not centuries.  And Valentine's Day is all about romance (and demonstrating romantic love has long been associated with gifts). 

The new genre of holidays and events actually have a proper name:  pseudo-events.  These are events that have been created and, incidentally, have become major retail occasions. 

I'm old enough to remember Super Bowl I.  It was an exciting event, but nothing like the Super Bowl is today.  Imagine what the Frito-Lay or Budweiser bottom line would look like without Super Bowl.  Those Super Bowl sales are really incremental ... and they are directly attributable to an event that has been created by the entertainment and advertising industries. 

So if you're looking to build sales, consider finding the trigger that will tip consumer dormancy into action.  It's best to build on a plausible platform (like Christmas or Valentines Day).  But you can create your own pseudo events as well.  In destination marketing, Festivals serve that purpose.  Aloha Week in Hawaii isn't something that Hawaiian natives developed - it was clearly created as a pseudo event.  However, it builds on an existing idea and makes an event out of it ... which, the destination hopes, will prompt people to travel and spend money.