Health and the Future of Business

I ran across this description of an unknown company and just had to share. It was cut out of a long business article I wrote back in 2008, and has a fun twist at the end:

"Farmed in the Amazon rainforest and vacuum packed for freshness just outside the forest, Amazonia’s range of natural forest fruits, plants and herbs has taken the worldwide market by storm. Americans appreciate that their purchases help preserve one of the earth’s last remaining ecosystems, but they plunk down their cash mainly because researchers at the Mayo-Harvard Clinic have proven that consuming the products can lengthen your life span.

Amazonia is the first company to elect a CEO by consumer voting in 2011 and the company has ten customers on its board that it rotates every six months. Amazonia co-develops new product lines with its customer base, taking on millions of suggestions annually and sharing revenue with the creators of the best ideas.

Amazonia sponsors all the health shows on the Discovery Broadcasting Corporation (DBC), including in-transit broadcasts on worldwide commuter networks. People watching the shows can buy Amazonia’s products and services using their embedded personal electronic device. The company sponsors the Global Elderly Games in North Korea, which plan to attract 20,000 athletes over the age of 70 competing in sports events including over 30 types of physical video games."

As you guessed, Amazonia is fictional. It comes from the fertile imagination of Ed Cotton, director of strategy at marketing agency Butler, Shine, Stern & Partners, best known for its Mini Cooper ads.

You know, back in 2008 Amazonia sounded wildly futuristic. Today, I bet you thought for minute that it might be real. Next year, it probably will be.

What a world.

---Joan

Who eats Spam?

Spam, the brand, has an interesting situation in front of it. As a 70-year-old product--precooked pork butt in a can -- it is lucky to still be alive. But in those 70 years, the brand became the butt of jokes by Monty Python (Spamalot) and Weird Al Yankovic, and consequently was morphed into the very common term for junk email. Fame moves in mysterious ways.
Now the sales of Spam, the meat, are going up, up, up and parent company Hormel is running a big ad and marketing campaign and new campy website.
It seems spam email is helping sell Spam meat because the funny and unlikely connection between the two is making people curious. The ads and website satisfy the curiousity.
But do you know anyone who really eats Spam? Have you bought any lately? Based on the sales figures someone must be buying the stuff....maybe it is a secret pleasure....like governors have for hookers.
The company itself is mum. They finished a study of their core consumers and are not giving any hints of what they've found.
It's hard to figure out who's sending all that spam email---and almost as hard to figure out who eats Spam meat.
What is up with that?