Packaging Transforming Content

I thought I'd found a new café. In this new English market town I've moved to. The café is above the street. Like the one in The Pursuit of Love where Aunt Sadie takes Matt to question him about Jassy running away. It's whitewashed, bright, with thick wool carpet. (I reached down from my chair to stroke it.)

I sat at a window overlooking the charity shops, hairdressers and other cafes, listening in on elderly women's coffee chat. 'With global warming, you’ll soon not be able to talk about casting ne’er a clout'. ... 'When the care home over the heath wasn't doing very well, my sister would check herself in there while my brother-in-law cooled off after an argument. He told her it'd serve her right if during one of these all laid on luxury sulks she popped her clogs'. ... 'You know my gas man has type-two diabetes? He can also read electricity meters'.

My hot chocolate, which came in a cup a saucer, accompanied by three toasted marshmallows on a glass Bon Bon, was rich and nutty, with a star dusting of cocoa powder. I wondered what brand the café used?

I climbed up to the cafe again last week, this time for take-away. There was a much younger crowd in, failing to control their elbows as they ate huge, shiny, cocktail stick staked burgers. There was no chat for me to overhear.

I watched as the server grabbed the frothing jug, roux whisk and long handled spoon. She reached behind the coffee machine.

And did she bring out a By Royal Appointment gilt and turquoise tin?

No. It was a shrieking purple tub of Cadbury's Drinking Chocolate.

See, if I hadn't seen that, I'd still be going in there.

#contentoverpackaging #marketing #brand #branddesign

Comments

Some Favourite Books - But Please don't Lesbify Dame Agatha's Denouements

I'm too tired to read anything new so have been round the libraries taking out my default-setting books to read over Christmas. These include: The Pursuit of Love , Nancy Mitford. The blood-stained entrenching tool displayed above the fireplace, child-hunting over Shenley Common, Jassy traumatising the local children telling them the facts of life. The scene at the Gare du Nord where Linda sits on her luggage to cry and meets Fabrice always takes me back to the first reading of the novel, sitting wrapped in my Welsh Tweed shawl, in a tiny bedroom on the eighteenth floor of a high-rise in Kennington. The Pursuit of Love is romantic, hilarious and bleakly eccentric. Confessions of a Failed Southern Lady , Florence King. When I entertained troops on the American base in Kandahar, four South Carolina army captains made me an Honorary Southern Belle. Madame Galina, they said, in all her unreasonable, high-blooded, simpering flounce reminded them of the girls

My Mate Jamie-Ray Hartshorne

I've been noticing that alongside photos of Jamie-Ray being a lead in Altar Boys , creating Change My Body UK TM , working the door at Freedom - and clearly asking people passing by wherever that rockpool may be to snap a double-bicep - this sort of thing is cropping up on his social media: We're in The Diner, Jamestown Road, Camden. He's between tour dates of The Bodyguard, and meetings to discuss sportswear and creatine endorsements. The latter, he says, being all about making his product better. Between sips of his peanut butter milkshake (he's allowing himself dairy today in my honour - I don't quite know how to take that) he says in his soft Brum, 'I've signed up for a major Muay Thai event in Thailand next February. I'm going up against one of the Thai fighters. That's the only real way to gain any respect in the fighting world. That's why you've been noticing the combat photos. I've been going for tr

Where do Babies Come From? How we Learn about Sex...Book Just Launched on Amazon Kindle

Click to buy the book 'My spoken material is about the facts of life,' I was explaining to the Mother Superior. 'I've been asking people what they were told, how they were told it and did they ask questions. Terribly funny...' During my Where do Babies Come From? talk at the Metrodeco Café, Brighton, a superfluity of nuns stopped at the window to listen. In the street later that week one of them glided up and said how much they had enjoyed hearing me sing. ' And we wonder, might you please sing something for our charity evening?' I said, of course, sister. The nun nodded. 'That's very good to hear. But just to correct you: not sister - but Mother Superior.' She then asked about the spoken material in the show, in case some might be included on the night? I explained that I had been reading from my forthcoming book. While on tour I had asked people how they had

Iestyn Edwards Wonders...is it Lumpy or Runny?

Search This Blog