Schools and Marketing: Notes from the Chalkface

Consider these questions: does your own tailor make your clothes for you or do you shop in chain stores? Do you shop for food in a major supermarket or does the local corner shop deliver your food? When it comes to a new car: what do you choose ? A hand built Aston Martin at £200,000 or something less recherche manufactured by Ford, GM or Nissan? This paper looks at how for most of us the goods and services we consume are produced by large, often global, organisations that have developed high quality items at a reasonable price. Our world today is increasingly dominated by brands. Each strives to create the illusion of exclusivity in a world of plenty. As such branded goods appeal to our sense of individuality and identity. Amidst the emptiness of so much consumption we come to trust these friendly trademarks that offer the promise of security and permanence in a world where few things last long.