What's in a Name?
Let's put aside the blatant hypocrisy of Rep. Mark Foley's recent actions for a moment for something a little more refreshing. Knowing that a member of congress who masqueraded as an advocate for protecting children on the Internet is actually a practicing homosexual pedophile stalker online turns my stomach anyway, so let's put it on hold for a later post and keep this one light, shall we?
Okay.
There's a little "Stop and Rob" store down the street from my house, and I admit that I pop in there quite frequently to get myself a nice, refreshing fountain drink.
By the way, is it proper to say "convenient store"? Or is it "convenience store"? I think when I'm speaking, it flows out of my mouth as "convenient store", but I'm not sure which is correct.
Anyway, the soda is the only item in the store for which I'm willing to hand over my money. I don't buy anything else there, because purchasing most any item in the place requires a loan application and a credit check. Their stuff ain't cheap. But fountain sodas are not easy to come by in the larger grocery stores, so I'll gladly plunk down my dollar eighteen for a bucket of brown carbonated sugar water at the local Bag 'n Wag.
To me, fountain sodas are the way to go. They're my favorite way to simultaneously consume a half pound of sugar and enough caffeine to resuscitate Marlon Brando's corpse. I don't favor the diet or caffeine-free variety of soda, so if you ever meet me on the street and my teeth are rotted out and my heart explodes right in front of you, you'll know it was from too many fountain drinks.
But I think the various Grab 'n Dash stores have given up on marketing their sodas. Aside from 7-Eleven, none of them seem to be concerned with giving their fountain drinks cool names anymore. Most of the ones I see these days are simply named for the quantity of liquid they hold. The cup dispensers are loaded with containers marked 20 oz, 32 oz, 44 oz, and yes even 64 oz.
Come on. That's not even trying.
These aren't just measuring devices. Once we fill them with soda, they come to life. They're delicious pick-me-ups. They are identifiers that signify social status as well as thirst level. They are symbolic of our American ideal for over-consumption, as well as of our right to be unhealthy. They are fairly screaming out to be the objects of a brand loyalty war. They should be emblazoned with bold print on the cup, and swirling day-glo colors that can be seen from space, and yet . . . And yet the passenger floorboard of my JEEP is littered with plain white Styrofoam cups with 32 oz written on them in a sterile, block font.
Now, it's not hard to understand that 7-Eleven is so successful because of their fountain drink marketing. Everything else in the store is as overpriced as any other store, but we all know the name 7-Eleven because of the Big Gulp.
The Big Gulp is a wonderful name for a drink isn't it? It flows off the tongue and is genius in its simplicity.
But even though they are far more successful than the stores that choose not to name their drinks, 7-Eleven is not complacent. They don't rest on their salted nuts. They have taken fountain drink naming to a whole other level with the Big Gulp car cup, the Super Big Gulp, and yes even (cue trumpet music and fanfare) the X-treme Gulp!!
The other stores simply have to get on board with the naming of their fountain drinks, or they risk losing out to the 7-Elevens of the world. And we can use this blog as a means to offer some suggestions to them, if for nothing else than to prod market competition.
I'll write down a couple of mine, and if you have suggestions for soda names, you can simply leave them in a comment at the end of this post.
For a large drink geared toward the caffeine junky, a friend of mine suggested The Big Shaky as a possible name. I suggested the small then be called The Little Twitchy. Of course it may make better sense to keep the names less specific to the content and more specific to the fact that it's an enormous fountain drink.
So, we might offer names like The Colossus, or The Big Sipper, or El Grande Swigarillo, or The Bladder Buster.
At any rate, let's do our best to spark the soda wars.
Meanwhile, I'm getting thirsty. Good thing I get half-price refills.
Okay.
There's a little "Stop and Rob" store down the street from my house, and I admit that I pop in there quite frequently to get myself a nice, refreshing fountain drink.
By the way, is it proper to say "convenient store"? Or is it "convenience store"? I think when I'm speaking, it flows out of my mouth as "convenient store", but I'm not sure which is correct.
Anyway, the soda is the only item in the store for which I'm willing to hand over my money. I don't buy anything else there, because purchasing most any item in the place requires a loan application and a credit check. Their stuff ain't cheap. But fountain sodas are not easy to come by in the larger grocery stores, so I'll gladly plunk down my dollar eighteen for a bucket of brown carbonated sugar water at the local Bag 'n Wag.
To me, fountain sodas are the way to go. They're my favorite way to simultaneously consume a half pound of sugar and enough caffeine to resuscitate Marlon Brando's corpse. I don't favor the diet or caffeine-free variety of soda, so if you ever meet me on the street and my teeth are rotted out and my heart explodes right in front of you, you'll know it was from too many fountain drinks.
But I think the various Grab 'n Dash stores have given up on marketing their sodas. Aside from 7-Eleven, none of them seem to be concerned with giving their fountain drinks cool names anymore. Most of the ones I see these days are simply named for the quantity of liquid they hold. The cup dispensers are loaded with containers marked 20 oz, 32 oz, 44 oz, and yes even 64 oz.
Come on. That's not even trying.
These aren't just measuring devices. Once we fill them with soda, they come to life. They're delicious pick-me-ups. They are identifiers that signify social status as well as thirst level. They are symbolic of our American ideal for over-consumption, as well as of our right to be unhealthy. They are fairly screaming out to be the objects of a brand loyalty war. They should be emblazoned with bold print on the cup, and swirling day-glo colors that can be seen from space, and yet . . . And yet the passenger floorboard of my JEEP is littered with plain white Styrofoam cups with 32 oz written on them in a sterile, block font.
Now, it's not hard to understand that 7-Eleven is so successful because of their fountain drink marketing. Everything else in the store is as overpriced as any other store, but we all know the name 7-Eleven because of the Big Gulp.
The Big Gulp is a wonderful name for a drink isn't it? It flows off the tongue and is genius in its simplicity.
But even though they are far more successful than the stores that choose not to name their drinks, 7-Eleven is not complacent. They don't rest on their salted nuts. They have taken fountain drink naming to a whole other level with the Big Gulp car cup, the Super Big Gulp, and yes even (cue trumpet music and fanfare) the X-treme Gulp!!
The other stores simply have to get on board with the naming of their fountain drinks, or they risk losing out to the 7-Elevens of the world. And we can use this blog as a means to offer some suggestions to them, if for nothing else than to prod market competition.
I'll write down a couple of mine, and if you have suggestions for soda names, you can simply leave them in a comment at the end of this post.
For a large drink geared toward the caffeine junky, a friend of mine suggested The Big Shaky as a possible name. I suggested the small then be called The Little Twitchy. Of course it may make better sense to keep the names less specific to the content and more specific to the fact that it's an enormous fountain drink.
So, we might offer names like The Colossus, or The Big Sipper, or El Grande Swigarillo, or The Bladder Buster.
At any rate, let's do our best to spark the soda wars.
Meanwhile, I'm getting thirsty. Good thing I get half-price refills.
posted by Sam Ogden at
12:22 PM
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1 comments
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