Safety - Always
Construction is one of the most dangerous industries. Too frequently, however, building product sales literature inadvertently promotes unsafe practices.
This is especially a problem with photographs. Art directors and graphic designers that are unfamiliar with the hazards of construction are often attracted to images that show reckless practices. For example:
- A model is posed in a heroic stance, high on a scaffold or exposed structure... without a safety harness.
- A power tool operator shows a smile and steady, confident eyes... but is not equiped with goggles or dust mask.
- A video shows an inspector closely examining a product rolling down an assembly line... but does not wear a hair net to prevent his or her long tresses from getting tangled in the conveyor belt.
- People are installing a product at the bottom of a trench... that is not shored.
Marketing communications can help to establish a culture of safety in construction. Sales literature should not show dangerous practices.
Keep your customers alive!
Posts
1 comments:
As one who inspects safety procedures and equipment (in addition to initiating documents for site procedures) I absolutely agree. Sort of. I find the referenced ads foolish and silly - but I also thought the old video of OJ Simpson (err - maybe a bad example...) running and jumping into the driver's seat of a rental convertible (sans seatbelt) pretty dangerous looking as well. Yet I KNEW that. And I KNOW these ads are "posed", even the ones appearing to look "live" (I've shot thousands of such pictures myself to use in training - "do this" and "don't do this" examples for safety training, and specifically-posed pictures showing a tool's operation that exposes one glaring violation - because the specific function can't be seen WITH proper safety systems in place).
The marketing/advertising consultants that create campaigns and pose models are striving for relationship-based attention - a picture of a half naked girl with a hard hat and hammer/drill (that weighs as much as her medically-enhanced center-of-gravity alteration prominences) relies on the age old mantra: "sex sells". Examples in Michael's post demonstrate the "unreality" of almost ALL advertising, with or without sexual innuendo. Even an unsuspecting, 6th-generation mineworker with a fluctuating IQ based on room temp has the innate senses of 1) fear/flight and 2) "that looks dumb, Zeke" analysis in the most primal "that might hurt me" form possessed by even dogs or cats (well, MOST cats, anyway). Will such ads cause unsafe behavior? Sure. So does an ad for an innocuous sugar-and-caffeine packed soft drink (consumption of which can lead to obesity). Consumers - whether professional or not - are not dumb...sometimes.
There are checks-and balances that temper the problem (with an emphasis on "checks" having two meanings in the legal world: the "functional" one and the "written tender"...aka "expensive...one). To apply a M.C. Escher-ist twist to a hackneyed phrase of war:"Kill 'em all and let Lawyers sort 'em out".
All seriousness aside (um, nix that and replace with "all horrendously bad humor...and grammar...aside") I don't disagree that safety violations should NOT be allowed in any advertising. The insurmountable issue, though, is that instituting such a mandate means changing ALL forms of advertising, removing the essential human elements and psychology on which the entire industry is based.
To quote The Firesign Theater: "You can't get there from here".
Post a Comment