cathy

I needed a total reboot, and all I had was a lousy cup of coffee. Bam, bam – the throbbing in my head was so loud I thought my eyes might be bulging in rhythm with it. I did not want to be in the meeting room, but there I was at 10 A.M. for a session of what we called “team brainstorming.” Bad name, since I was the one on the team with all the good ideas. And that morning, I was the only one whose brain was storming. ###

Damn if I was going to let my pulsing head stop me. It was hard, but I took myself by the shoulders (ad men imagine stuff all the time) and said, Jack, you can do this. We’re the geniuses who made Marlboro from a lady’s cigarette to a man’s. And we have to step up to the plate again and get them to buy more. And how are we going to do this? Premiums! Every gas station and bank and candy company was giving away something with their product, and we had to give men a reward for smoking our brand. We had to do it before other brands came up with the idea. But what? An ashtray? I knew everybody else on the team would suggest it. You smoke cigarettes; you need an ashtray, right? Their ideas were always the easy ones. Easy and dumb.###

So I’m finishing my coffee and getting up to for another cupful when the guys start talking about “premium” objects that have been used by other companies. I hear them saying “toaster” and “jelly jar” and “ice cream scoop.” I hear mention of bubble gum and comic books. But we should be talking about cigarettes, one of them says, and then they start coming up with cigarette related items: a lighter, a box of matches, an ashtray. Just like I predicted. ###

I’d rather see a jelly jar or an ice cream scoop than any of those lame-brained things, I tell them. I must have gotten a little angry, cause they were all giving me this hangdog look. When I get angry, my blood pressure rises. I was sipping at my coffee and the pressure was making my head scream. It was screaming, I don’t need coffee, you fool, I need a hair of the dog that bit me. ###

That was when Marlboro’s new premium appeared like a vision to me. I needed spiked coffee. You can’t have spiked coffee from the company urn, but you could have it if you brought it in to work yourself, in a thermos. I pictured this thermos in red and white plastic, with the Marlboro name on it. I picture pouring its hot (spiked) coffee into my cup and my headache eased immediately, both in my fantasy and in reality. It was a great idea whose time had come.