Consumerism the savvy and sucker consumer?

Consumerism -The movement seeking to protect and inform consumers by requiring such practices as honest packaging and advertising, product guarantees, and improved safety standards.

Savvy consumer - Is someone who is a knowledgeable and who is a clever consumer who is knowledgeable in their specific market. Here is an article to show how to be a savvy consumer http://www.wikihow.com/Be-a-Savvy-Consumer

Sucker consumer - An individual that follows trends of fashion and who is victim of clever advertisement from businesses.

Advertisement and promotion is vital as businesses need to create awareness to promote and sell products to create more footfalls and profits. Research and development is used by businesses to research what consumers want to target the audience and create as much revenue as possible.

The marketing and advertisement is where firms separate us from our hard earned cash, and cleverly tempt us into buying their products, this can be done through a range of advertisement techniques.

http://www.foothilltech.org/rgeib/english/media_literacy/advertising_techniques.htm = here a few examples of advertisement techniques


                                                                                                                                                                      

This could be an example of Testimonial marketing using a celebrity to endorse a product, to gain revenue. Also this could be an example of Patriotism in sports consumerism using a British athlete like Jessica Ennis would boost sales for the clothing she is wearing firstly as she is a huge celebrity and secondly it promotes British athletics and sport.

Are you a savvy or a sucker consumer I believe it can vary on what the product is we all have weak points when it comes to consumerism and us buying products.

I believe im a sucker consumer when it comes to sport equipment mainly running shoes and football boots.

Edward Bernays was the first psychologists to understand the true power of advertizement and the way it works .

 
The main reason of him being famous was his actions during the cigarette campaign in America in 1920s.Women were only allowed to smoke in designated areas, or not at all. If caught violating this rule, women would have been arrested. Bernays created a campaign of the 1929 Easter parade showing models holding lit Lucky Strike cigarettes.  After the historical public event, women started lighting up more than ever before. Bernays in fact made women's smoking habits socially acceptable and this raised revenues for many tobacco companies in America. This shows the power of the advertisement and how it has control over us the consumers.

Evaluating this, are you a savvy or sucker consumer? and do you let advertising control you?