Brace Yourselves

     Anyone who knows anything knows that this year was absolutely cluttered with minions. I cannot think of a product or franchise I have seen in my lifetime that has had more advertising campaigns. Children, and even adults, are so invested in minion culture that it is obvious Dreamworks' marketing team has left a love mark. As mentioned in the documentary "The Persuaders", a love mark is something that attracts people so strongly to a brand that they can no longer provide a reason for why they like it so much; they just do. Although some people have noticed and been fed up with the excessive amounts of advertising, people everywhere just keep consuming. I couldn't even think of a reason why minions would be so likable, but they still are able to show up on numerous products and even have their own movie. Not only has Dreamworks left love marks on the general population, but also other companies who have used the minion characters on their products as well. Some of these big brands include: Tic Tacs, Amazon, Duck Brand Duck Tape, Betty Crocker, General Mills, Hasbro, Motts, Crayola, McDonalds, Twinkies (Hostess), Haribo, Nabisco, Bounty, Chiquita, and Kraft, just to name a few. It is clear that love marks have been left on these other companies as well because none of them (except maybe Chiquita bananas) have any relations to these characters, which means they are interested in them for to reasons: one because they have sparked interest or attraction in these other companies (love marks), and two because they see it as a way to sell more products to people who also feel connected to minions, and the company itself (double love mark). This outrageous cross-marketing has shown me how repetitive advertisers can be if they have the right elements to affect the right audience. Although their continuous appearances in the media have annoyed me, I guess minions were doing something right, with a box office gross of over 1.1 billion dollars.