"Cyber Monday" is PR BS

The online-retail industry group Shop.org wants us to refer to today as "Cyber Monday" -- the online-shopping equivalent of "Black Friday." Here's the industry press release about this effort.

The idea, I guess, is to create an online shopping frenzy on the Monday after Thanksgiving. Why not just shop online on "Black Friday" and avoid the crowds? Two reasons: 1) Shop.org is a subsidiary of the National Retail Federation, an industry group that also represents the brick-and-mortar stores, so they don't want to pit online shoppers against their other constituents; and 2) most people go back to work on Monday -- and they figure we do most of our online shopping while on the clock.

The National Retail Federation seems to be suggesting that decreased productivity can be good for the nation's economy. I for one, don't approve of this. Workers shouldn't be shopping online during office hours -- it takes away from time they ought to be spending reading blogs.

It's brazenly cynical for an industry group to think they can just introduce a new catch-phrase and expect this phrase to alter Americans' shopping patterns. For such a scheme to work, you'd have to have a naive and easily manipulated press that lazily parrots industry press releases without the slightest qualm. You'd have to have a press and a public incapable of asking that most basic of questions: "Says who?"

So, in other words, it's working like a charm.

Hundreds of articles online, and many more on TV and radio, laud today as "Cyber Monday." Most of them, like this CNN/Money article, swallow the phrase whole without ever mentioning where it came from:

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- It's take two in the holiday bargain frenzy, as holiday shoppers fresh from Black Friday surf the Internet from home and especially work for even more holiday deals on Cyber Monday, one of the busiest online shopping days of the year.

"Baaaa," the article continues. "Baa, baa, baaaaaaaa."

Even worse are the many articles -- like this one from Time -- attributing the phrase only to "analysts":

Many Web merchants wait until the Monday after Thanksgiving — dubbed "Black Monday" or "Cyber Monday" by retail analysts — to introduce their holiday sales specials.

You know, "retail analysts." The ones employed by the NRF.

Thus a PR effort by the online retail industry is rechristened as a work of science -- the product of disinterested academics and not a deliberate industry ploy to spur more shopping.

The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist. The PR flacks of corporate America are successfully imitating this trick. And our lazy press is helping them.

Updated: Changed the name of the post thanks to Steve's excellent suggestion.

Comments

[Pat B.]

Y'know I heard the phrase on NPR this morning and thought, "When did they come up with 'Cyber Monday?'" Now I know, today...

[Steve]

Fred, so glad to see you writing this...

"Cyber Monday" was the featured headline on the CNN.com's homepage. I started reading the article and thought...hmmm...I didn't realize today would be such a big on-line shopping day...but I guess it makes sense....hey, wait a minute...

I wondered the very thought you are proposing...but quickly passed onto the next article and forgot about it.

All hail Love Day!

[Steve]

Oh, and one other thing...I did a little searching and why do some of the articles start with something like "On-line retailers gear up for Cyber Monday..."

Even if Cyber Monday does exist...what do they have to "gear-up" for? Extra bandwidth?

...btw, I wish your post title was something like "Cyber Monday a Load of Crap" so people stumbling across this phrase in google searched would get the idea...quickly...succintly...

How can we get a counter message out to kill off this idea?

[substitute]

A simple rule that has never failed me in over five years: whenever you see the word "cyber", replace it with "bozo".

[grenadine]

hmmm, i just ran into that Usual Suspect quote on another site. strange how these things mass up.

steve, i guess they'd be "gearing up" by increasing the caffine supply for the techies - heaven forbid the website drags at all. why, I might choose to shop at anther URL instead. The horrors!

[Fade]

I work in an online retail store, and the Monday after Thanksgiving is dreadful. Four days of orders to catch up on from the long weekend, so many people starting their Christmas shopping, near the deadline for international orders using non-expedited shipping methods to have a reasonable chance of the packages arriving in time... But I don't see any particular reason to give this day a stupid name. And as someone who has to run around pulling books from the shelves and putting together orders, I'd really prefer it not be pushed for a harder feeding frenzy.

Won't someone have pity on the poor retail workers, and spread out their shopping days a little more?

[Mark]

Fade-- I've long been an advocate of holding one Christmas each month. When you celebrate Christmas depends on your last name. January 25 would be "A-C Christmas", February would be "D-E", etc. Spread the chaos out a little. December 25 ends up being "X-Z Christmas", or "Xmas", maintaining backward compatibility.

Since there are so few names in the X-Z group, and since it seems like everyone needs some kind of winter festival, we'd all get in on Xmas with a Thanksgiving-like gathering of family and friends, secure in the knowledge that the gift-giving, decorating, weird music, and religious aspects were handled earlier in the year by one of the New Christmases, and all we have to do is enjoy a big meal together.

[SilverLuz]

It's not much, but there's at least one news outlet that doesn't buy it:
Cyber Monday, Marketing Myth @ BusinessWeek

[Steve]

SilverLuz: Thanks for the link...

[Duane]

Pagan symbols celebrating the Sun God's eventual triumph over Nature don't seem nearly as threatening when we call them Christmas trees.

And, back to topic, I haven't listened to Christmas music since spending two seasons in retail 15 years ago. Which puts a serious dent in my relationship with Christ, ya know, because according to just about every verse in Scripture, Jesus really digs singing. And the disciples spent more time caroling than missionarying.

[cjmr's husband]

I know I was sorely disappointed that the Daily Show and the Colbert Report reported Cyber Monday straight; maybe they didn't know. Maybe Tuesday they did retractions...

[Fhydra]

Black Friday isn't the biggest shopping day in terms of sales, but that doesn't really stop businesses from giving the day after Thanksgiving that name either. I'm sure Black Friday started the same way businesses are trying to start Cyber Monday. By advertising large sales and giving it a name.

But if you really want to keep workers reading blogs, instead of shopping online next year, I suggest that you start Left Behind Mondays :)