NFIB

Friend or Faux?
02/ 27/ 2003

by Harvey King

These days, if you see a commercial featuring beauty shots of Main Street, chances are the ad is promoting a massive company. Seeking to keep consumers from associating the tarnished images of corporate brass with the products and services they sell, big companies are spending big to look small.

I'd do the same. One doesn't have to be John Nash to understand the math of polling results regarding how Americans perceive the difference between "small business" and "big business." Small business ranks so much higher, you'd think the pollsters are asking questions like, "Who do you trust more: A jet-setting, inside-trader with $6,000 shower curtains, or your daughter's soccer coach who owns the neighborhood hardware store?"

The resulting "We're small and friendly" marketing seems as authentic as a dad's use of the word "dude" in a conversation with teenagers.

Welcome to the age of the faux Small Business.

Currently running on cable news and financial channels is an advertising campaign touting the power of a customer relationship management software designed to help operators in a 500-person call center handle shoppers like they "used to be treated" at small retailers. Then, there's that smiling gray-haired greeter welcoming me to the cozy confines of a 200,000 square-foot mega-store.

You know you're experiencing faux when a franchised fast service restaurants offers you "home-cooked" dishes from Grandma Pearl's family recipe.

You can feel the faux by dropping into any of the thousands of locations of at least two chains of "general stores," or do your "hometown banking" at a financial institution operating coast-to-coast.

Soon, marketers will discover other ways to make their massive companies look small. Look for big gains in the number of advertising pages appearing in the backs of high school yearbooks. Fortune 500 sponsorship of church bazaars and bingo games will be the next new thing. Surely, negotiations are taking place nationwide for naming rights on Little League fields.

For the record, I'm a big fan of big businesses. I only drive cars manufactured by them. All my computers and shipping services are from big companies. But I like my favorite big businesses to be honest with me. I like them to say, "We're the best because we have locations on every corner in the known-universe." I like them to unashamedly claim they're Number 1, or at least they try harder because they are Number 2.

We are lucky to live and do business in a nation whose economy is vast enough to make room for those of us who prefer the risks and opportunities and life of running a small business while still providing plenty of space for companies big enough to sponsor the Super Bowl.

But dudes, let's keep it real.

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This article originally appeared in the February/March 2003 issue of MyBusiness magazine.

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