Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Hands Off Our Holidays :: Spike the Cookies

The holidays are here and everyone is gearing up for familiar traditions. No Christmas holiday is complete without cookies. There is something about this holiday that requires one to bake. Even the non-baker in the family can be found creating a Christmas Cookie masterpiece on any given day leading up to the Christmas holiday.

Cookies are a part of Christmas and therefore the alcohol industry wants in. While watching TV earlier this month with my husband we were blindsided by a commercial for Jack Daniel's Whiskey. It featured a group of ladies standing in the kitchen baking. It zoomed in on a bottle of Jack Daniel's Tennessee Whiskey, then in on a batch of freshly baked cookies, then to a lady pouring a large glass of whiskey and sitting down with that and one of the cookies for a snack. The tag line:

"The new recipe for the holidays: Gather friends, Add a splash of Jack, Stir the Conversation. Mix Jack in to your holidays. 'Tis the season to drink responsibly."

The commercial directs you to visit their website, spikethecookies.com. Which takes you to a section of the Jack Daniel's Facebook Page. Which can be accessed by anyone including those under the age of 21. It takes exactly 3 clicks to change your age on Facebook.


Jack Daniel's takes it one step further by encouraging you to share your "traditions with a twist". They ask visitors to leave a message with the ways that you celebrate the holidays with Jack Daniels. You can also create a "spike the cookies" Facebook event for you and your friends, and view recipes online.

In their description on Facebook they cleverly encourage you to drink while baking. "of course, sampling the ingredients while baking is customary".

Jack Daniel's is also providing compensation to women in the blogging world to write about their holiday traditions using Jack Daniel's.

This is just one example of the many ways the alcohol industry tries to get in on our holiday traditions. Not only do adults see these messages but their is no telling how many youth are seeing these commercials, blogs and Facebook posts as well.



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