Consumerism

In the modern, ultra-competitive time we live in today, businesses are willing to use whatever is at their disposal to draw in customers and sell their product or service. Often, these companies exploit the impulsiveness of consumers in order to draw them in. We all know that companies strategically place items in a certain orders to sell more product, or play particular music, but some even go as far as making the store smell a certain way to make the shopper feel happier and therefore willing to spend more money. All these strategies to get the buyer to spend more money than they really should are the business's effort to exploit the impulsiveness of human nature. In "marrying absurd", Didion mentions how the chapels who are advertising weddings are acting on the impulsive nature of their consumers using in-your-face advertising, and trying to persuade people to get married with "Free License Information", as well as offering incentives such as "Free transportation from your motel to courthouse to chapel and return to motel". These chapels do not actually care about the people getting married, but rather, selling their "product" to as many people as they can. Unfortunately, this is one of the consequences of living in the very competitive time that we reside in. Businesses today don't really care about their consumers, as they would like them to believe, but really about making profit, and they will gladly exploit the impulsiveness of their customers if it means they will make more money.