Babes in Willy Loman-land

Tue, 29 Feb 2000 17:00:00 +0000

My daughter brought home a lot of stuff during her first week in kindergarten. Most of it was benign. But mixed in among the pleadings to join the PTA, entreaties to check the family pillows for head lice and a laughably unsavvy bit of propaganda about the nutritional hazards of soft drinks was something quite shocking.

It was a little package from Sally Foster, who is not the matronly school librarian but, rather, a division of Entertainment Publications Inc., a supplier of fund-raising materials that is itself a subsidiary of Cendant Publishing. In the package was a catalog of candy and assorted nuts, gift wrapping, picture frames, baubles, trinkets, doodads and other crap for sale.

Sally (we're on a first-name basis since I saw her mug shot on the inside front cover of the catalog) wasn't trying to sell me anything, at least not directly. It's much worse than that. She had recruited my daughter -- variously a budding veterinarian, cashier, paleontologist and cleaning lady -- to peddle her goods to others. As in door-to-door, in-your-face direct marketing. Mom, Dad, meet the newest member of EPI's corporate sales team -- your offspring.

Salon.com > Bob Whitby

Babes in Willy Loman-land