The New York Times had an article on Tuesday about the increase in commercials for Veterans Day.
Acknowledging the Veterans on Their Day in the Limelight.
Read it if you have a chance. This is the opening paragraph.
FOR Veterans Day 2011, Madison Avenue will seem redder, whiter and bluer than it has in a long time.
Advertisers had for many years marked the holiday in prosaic, almost formulaic ways, primarily by offering consumers Veterans Day sales on merchandise like cars, clothing and furniture. But more recently, with Americans at war in Afghanistan and Iraq, campaigns have become more creative and heartfelt — echoing the patriotic ads that showed support for the troops during World War II.
I've also seen a number of ads linked on Facebook and Twitter in the past few days.
This one from Boeing was filmed with real veterans from our armed forces.
This one for Walmart gets me every time.
Or Applebee's ad to the tune Stand Up by Sugarland.
Applebee's actually has an entire site devoted to this - Thankyoumovement.com
Budweiser has Coming Home with the slogan Proudly Serving those who Serve
note: Budweiser has a disclaimer that you need to be old enough to drink to watch this video
I've got to admit, I have mixed feelings reading the article and watching the videos.
Several days ago I read an interesting blog post by a veteran asking that people not just say thank you, but that they do something more meaningful to help veterans in need - something like helping a homeless vet or offering a job to a veteran.
According to the article, some of these companies are doing just that.
Many of the new campaigns for Veterans Day, which will be observed on Friday, have cause-marketing components, helping to raise money for organizations like the USO and the Wounded Warrior Project. In other instances, companies are pledging to add jobless veterans to their payrolls.
So what do you think?
I'm curious for everyone's opinions, but I'm especially interested to hear from veterans. Does this feel more like appreciation or commercialization to you?
The more I research my current book, the more aware I am of the depth of the sacrifices veterans have made for our county. So, if you are a veteran, please accept my heartfelt thanks today and everyday for the service you have given and the sacrifices you have made.
