How Corporate America Manipulates You – with Frivolous Days

We in the US all know the classic holidays: Easter, Veteran’s Day, President’s Day, and so on. But have you ever heard of “Splurge Day”? What about “International Nose Picking Day”? Or how about even “Take Your Plant for a Walk Day”? Many would agree that these last few are just too ridiculous. But then comes the next logical question: Why? Why are there just so many frivolous holidays? Who benefits from this?

Well, the answers to these questions are a little complicated, so hang tight as we dive into the history of holidays.

In the beginning, we had the classic holidays, each with their own unique history and story. Christmas is a complicated holiday, with many different meanings attached to it over the centuries. New Year’s celebrates, well, the New Year, as it has for centuries. Veteran’s Day was created to honor the work and the impact that veterans have had, and that encourages the support of veterans who struggle today.

Then came the era of the recognition days. It started with good intentions: people created the days and spread the word to encourage positivity, though it didn’t stay like that for long. As soon as corporations saw these recognition days, they started to think about how it could be used for marketing purposes, or even, how they could CREATE holidays for marketing purposes.

National Pancake Day? IHOP. 

International Coffee Day? The International Coffee Association. 

National Drive-Thru Day? Jack in the Box.

Even traditional holidays have been heavily marketed and influenced by corporations to suit them to their own needs. Anything you can think of has been heavily monetized by corporations. Candy companies have captured Halloween as a time for generous spending on candy and Valentine’s Day is a little more than a big basket of money for flower and candy companies (again). 

At this point, you might be asking yourself: “Well, now that I know this, what can I do? What’s the point of knowing this?”

If you want to stand up, there are many things you can do. You could raise awareness and tell people you know. You could use social media to spread the word to the world. And if you really can’t do anything, you could always do nothing: avoid putting a couple extra dollars in the pockets of manipulation.

Manipulation only works when you let it work, so take a stand with us against Corporate America and end the days of the frivolous holiday, today.