Have you ever wondered
why is it that millions, no, billions of people around the world wake up every
morning to bacon and eggs? If you ask most people that eat bacon and eggs for
breakfast, why do you eat bacon and eggs for breakfast, most people would say
that they got it from their parents, this is when I usually ask them, well, how
long do you think that families around the world been eating bacon and eggs for
breakfast, answers usually vary from hundreds on years, to thousands of years. What if I told you that families in the US did
not start eating bacon and eggs for breakfast until the 1920’s, would you
believe me?
Now if you eat bacon and eggs for breakfast, you are apart
of one of the most important marketing schemes in history. In this story, I
will connect one of the fathers of modern marketing to the consumerism
lifestyle that is so popular here in the US, than I will ask the question, is
it ethical, and allow you to make up your own mind. His name is Edward Bernays,
and his impact on your everyday life is more than you will ever know, just like
you didn’t know that he made you eat bacon and eggs for breakfast.
Edward Bernays died in 1995 at the age of 103,
he was the nephew of Sigmund Freud and he is credited with creating public
relations, which he considered to be “propaganda.” Bernays worked with numerous
US presidents creating propaganda for different wars. He studied his uncle’s
breakthrough research in psychology and decided that propaganda could also be
used to sell products. Since the Germans used propaganda during WW1 and WW2,
Bernays decided to call his new venture “public relations.” (Fathers of
Marketing, 2009)
Bernays first big corporate job was with the Beech-Nut
Packing Company. They hired him to help them sell more bacon. At this time,
most Americans were use to having a light breakfast that usually included toast
and coffee. Bernays paid some doctors to do a fake study that said it was better
to have a heavy breakfast, mainly “bacon and eggs” instead of a light
breakfast. These doctors than sent this study to other doctors and 4500 of them
replied and agreed with the study without doing their own research. This
information was then communicated to the public with the suggestion of “bacon
and eggs” as the new healthy breakfast. The effects of this marketing scheme is
still felt today all over the world. (Colf, 2007)
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| Consumerism! |
Sigmund Freud found that humans all have deep animal-like
desires buried deep in our psychological make-up. Bernays found that once you
can tap into these desires than you can shape people’s opinions towards certain
issues or certain products. This was the beginning of the consumerism society
that we live in today. In Bernays’
popular book “Propaganda” he said, ““We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas
suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of
the way in which our democratic society is organized” (1928)
Most of us marketing people can relate this with
branding. We live in an environment where it is hard to tell whether you have
been persuaded into liking a product, or do “you” really like the product. The
average person cannot tell the difference, and many marketers look at this
information about Edward Bernays and think that the ideas and practices that
Bernays started, and have been transferred into all aspects of marketing,
radio, politics, and news, is a gold mine of information. Life magazine named
Bernays one of the “most important people of the 20th century.” (Bernays
leaves legacy behind, 1995)
This is why
I want to challenge the reader “you” do some research on Bernays, there is an
awesome documentary by the BBC called “The Century of Self” that has plenty of
information on this subject, but I leave you with this question, do you think
that what Bernays called “ engineering of consent” is ethical? Comment Below!
“The
Conscious and Intelligent Manipulation of the Organized Habits and Opinions of
the Masses is an Important Element in a Democratic Society.” –Edward Bernays
(1928)
References
30 seconds on... : 'fathers' of marketing. (2009). Marketing
(00253650), 22.
Bernays, E. (1928) Propaganda. Retrieved on July 1, 2014.
Retrieved from http://www.whale.to/b/bernays.pdf
Bernays leaves legacy behind. Public Relations
Tactics [serial online]. April 1995;2(4):4.
Available from: Business Source Complete, Ipswich, MA. Accessed May 25, 2015.
Colf, R. T. (2007). Who's the Father of Public
Relations?. Public Relations Strategist, 13(4),
24-27.
