Dear Miss Geary
Do your new year’s resolutions tend to go in one ear and out the other? It’s my great pleasure to introduce Sense, our magazine for people who like to make the most of life and their money. From expert tips on managing the work-life balance to creating more space with inventive storage ideas or financing that much-needed extension, I hope it will help to make life better in 2008.
Alongside an exclusive profile of Nicole Kidman, you’ll find top spas put through their pampering paces, a prize draw for a luxury holiday in Thailand and advice on delicious healthy eating. And as you attend to your waistline, there’s help on getting your finances into shape too with an expert look at lending and an easy how-to guide to the stock market…
WTF?! My BANK is profiling Nicole Kidman, giving me home furnishing advice and telling me what to eat?!
Personally, I’m rather weirded out by this.
No great shock. It is another example of our aspirational society spinning out of control.
The bank is presenting you with the lifestyle you should aspire to – and if you can’t afford it, then the bank has plenty of “products” to help you (credit cards, loans etc).
The idea that I might want to aspire to a lifestyle outlined by the providers of my banking facilities doesn’t really sit well with me.
I’m all the more disheartened because I don’t buy lifestyle mags on principle. This principle was crystalised at the age of 16 after one summer I bought all the products reccommended by a teenage lifestyle magaizine and failed to acquire “the beach body that you desire”.
The fact that my bank has the audacity to send me such a publication in the post, without actually asking if I’d want it in the first place or with no opt-out information, strikes me as quite cheeky.
I switched to an ethical bank a few years ago and generally I’m happy with the service I get and the way it operates.
It does promote lifestyle products – clothes, gifts, trees (!) etc – by other ethical companies. I don’t mind so much about that, mainly because it does it very occasionally and not in an in your face kind of way. But I still get a bit twitchy that it is making assumptions about what types of businesses and traders I would support.
It is still aspirational, but in a much more caring, sharing and fluffy way and without the pressure selling and horrendous debt 😉
Hey – I’m trying a little Brum blogging tig and tag – and you’re it.