I’m going to say this straight out, because you’re going to think it in a minute anyway: I’m lazy.
I hate ripping labels off cans. I hate doing it for the recycling guy, I hate doing it for the Labels for Education collection box at school, I even hate doing it for some cool mail-in offer.
Several years ago, I collected American AAdvantage certificates off Kellogg cereal boxes, but never managed to get to 10. They wouldn’t give you miles for fewer than 10. I’m sure we ate more than 10 boxes of cereal that year; I simply lost interest in cutting out the offers. There’s just something low-down about pulling out the kitchen scissors to deal with the trash.
Then, last weekend I wanted to try a new recipe, Wild Rice Pilaf. I had the wild rice, the carrots and celery, the dried apricots. But, well, something basic was missing. And so, Confession No. 2: Mine is the only pantry in Minnesota without a can of Cream of Something Soup in it.
My husband volunteered to fetch one. Which was good of him, since he had spent the morning making chili. Six bean cans sat by the kitchen sink, washed and stripped of labels, but not carried out to the recycling bin. (He has the same degree of lazy, different variety.) So, when the Cream of Celery soup arrived, I knew I’d have to wash the can and, sigh, strip the label, or else look like some kind of recycling heathen.
Here’s the good part: What he brought home from the grocery store was a pop-top can. Now, my dear friends at Campbell Soup Co., this is brilliant. You really know how to treat a lazy gal. None of that futzing around with the can opener — just “pop” and “plop” and dinner’s on the way.
And here’s the even better part: The soup can was smaller than the bean cans. So all I had to do was rinse out my soup can, and slip it inside one of the bean cans with the label still on. Worked like a charm.
But the next morning I woke up wondering if there was some cool offer that I had inadvertently thrown away. (I don’t mind tossing an on-pack promotion; I just want to know about it before I ignore it.) So I tiptoed out to the recycling bin and found … a recipe for Classic Tuna Noodle Casserole. Puh-leeze. I haven’t eaten tuna casserole since I was a newlywed and my in-laws served it. (They called it “Tuna Barf.”)
You might think this laziness makes me a bad target for on-pack promotions. But “lazy people” are a genuinely desirable demographic, even if the packaged goods companies are too polite to call us that. We’re the folks that all the slippage calculations are based on. We’re interested enough in the offer to buy 10 boxes of cereal, but too easily distracted or, well, flat-out lazy, to follow through. Ahh. Pure profit. Lazy people are good for the bottom line.
Even better are optimistic lazy people. We always think we’ll do better next time. In fact, I’ve got my eye on a DVD offer on Keebler’s Toasted crackers. (Hi, Kellogg, it’s me again). Five proofs of purchase will get me my own copy of that bike-racing classic, Breaking Away. I cut one off the first box, and the second box is about halfway eaten. It’s a pretty long expiration date, so I’ll just stash them away as I go, in my desk drawer … right next to the American AAdvantage certificates.
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