65: How did we go from selling soap to selling our souls?

2022/12/7

Chapters

The episode explores how advertising transformed from straightforward product promotion in old magazines to sophisticated mind manipulation, using targeted ads and psychological tactics.

This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

It's easy and you can save money by doing it from your phone. Drivers who save by switching to Progressive save nearly $750 on average. And auto customers qualify for an average of seven discounts. Discounts for having multiple vehicles on your policy, being a homeowner and more.

So just like your favorite podcast, Progressive will be with you 24-7, 365 days a year, so you're protected no matter what. Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive.

Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customer surveyed who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary. Discounts not available in all states and situations. This is an ad by BetterHelp. What are your self-care non-negotiables? The things you know make you feel better even when it's impossible to make time for them.

Like that workout you try to squeeze in between kids' activities, work, and everything else you have going on, and before you know it, it gets pushed to tomorrow. Sound familiar? But it's the moments when you feel like you have no time for yourself when those non-negotiables are more important than ever. Those are the things that keep you strong, healthy, motivated, and prepared to take on everything life demands of you. So why not make therapy one of them?

BetterHelp Online Therapy makes it easy to get started with affordable phone, video, or live chat sessions you can do from anywhere, and the option to message your therapist between sessions if anything comes up. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash darkhistory today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash darkhistory. ♪

Hi friends, I hope you're having a wonderful day today. My name is Bailey Sarian and I'd like to welcome you to my study and also to my podcast, Dark History. If you don't know, this is a chance to tell the story like it is and honestly to share like the history of stuff we would never think about. Don't worry, I've got you covered this season with lots of nonsense. So all you have to do is sit back, relax, and just let me talk about that hot juicy history goss because baby girl Lisa, listen, it's good.

It's real good. So listen, when it's late at night and work is all done and I've had my microwavable dinner and there's nothing to watch on TV, what do I, what do you, I was gonna say, what do you do? But what do I do? I turn to social media. 'Cause sometimes you just wanna turn off your brain and just like mindlessly scroll, you know? So I open the app and then I see two ads right away. One is for beer and the other one is for a dating app. And it's like, come on.

Come on. Like, I know my life is sad. I get it. I was kind of a little offended because one, these ads are a little too targeted. Okay. And two, I don't even drink anymore. Like, they're like, this girl needs to get drunk and she needs to get laid. Let's help her out.

Is that bad? I don't know actually. I might recant my statement. Anyways, but let me tell you, it got me thinking about how ads used to be. Okay, I personally have a big collection of old magazines and vintage Sears catalogs and my favorite part is how they advertise products. I freaking love it. Okay, let me just read you an example. There's this one advertisement for malt extract, which I don't know what that is, but

It says, quote, if you are well to keep well, if you are sick to regain your health and strength, makes graceful curves instead of sharp angles. So beautiful. I don't know. I don't know. It's fun. I like reading them because it's like they had to get really creative with their words back then.

It's like how did we go from this to "hey Bailey get drunk on a first date and hopefully get some" you know? I don't know. I mean advertising used to just sell us normal everyday products but now it's like it's transformed into this creepy little worm trying to burrow into our heads and honestly violate violate our brains.

Okay, listen. So we're gonna talk about how advertising went from an innocent ad in a magazine to changing laws, making sex cells a thing, and eventually using tech to target us like predators. Oh, we need Chris Hansen to come in. Be like, excuse me, did she tell you how old she was? I'd be like, oh my god, yeah. You know what I'm talking about? Okay, great. So.

Like a good neighbor, Bailey is here. Maybe she's born with it. Maybe it's dark history. Either way, let's get into it. If you've ever felt like the decision to buy something was life or death, you have one guy to thank for it. Because this guy literally wrote the book of how to manipulate people into believing they need certain things. And with this knowledge, he changed the way companies sold things forever.

What an intro, huh? This man, his name was Edward Bernays. The first thing you should know about little Eddie over here is that his uncle was none other than Sigmund Freud. If you don't know, Freud was known as the father of modern psychology.

And he kind of like changed the game forever with some pretty controversial studies, you know? Anyways, Freud was hot shit in the 1920s. So being his nephew definitely gave Eddie some credibility.

People assumed he was also like this genius who understood how the human brain worked because of his uncle. And this for sure gave him, you know, a leg up professionally. It's all about who you know, right? Or who you related to. Eddie dabbled in the world of Broadway and producing plays, which is super random.

But I bring that up because Eddie killed it when it came to advertising like the Broadway plays. He became known for selling out shows, which ended up catching the eyes of the US government, who at the time was trying to create propaganda for the war. The definition of propaganda is information, especially of a biased or misleading nature used to promote or publicize a particular person's

political cause or point of view, just in case you didn't know. If you're like me, when you think of propaganda, you think of like those really aggressive posters that are like, enlist in the army, go kill yourself. I mean, like go kill those other people in the other country we hate. Just very, they're always yelling at you.

Okay. They can be very persuasive. Usually you feel a little threatened, right? And usually a bit one-sided. So Eddie, he came in and was kind of like noodling his thoughts of how to make war cool to the public. Like, how do I get them excited to join the army like I did to get them excited about the Broadway shows? Right?

So Eddie ends up making war posters that were more like movie posters that you'd see outside of a theater. So people walking by, they're stopping in their tracks and they're like, oh my God, I freaking love, I love that movie. Like there's one example where it's a poster of King Kong. And it's like, oh my God, I love that movie, right? I want to go fight King Kong and save hot women. Where do I sign up? They just kind of...

It looked fun, you know? So Eddie decides to take this little skill set of his and use it in the world of advertising. So he opens up his own agency and starts taking on tons of new clients. I'm talking about TV networks, hotels, huge companies like CBS.

General Electric, Dodge Motors, the list goes on. But actually one of his most famous success stories was for advertising the, wait for it, hairnet? The hairnet. You know a hairnet? Yeah, that's his work. Random, I know, I love it. But listen, this is how it starts off because there's one hairnet company who was in bad shape.

okay this hair net company is like dude we got to get out of the slump that we're in how are we going to do it no one had ideas so they reached out to eddie well at first eddie thinks okay well what if i get a bunch of female celebrities to tell the press that you know long hair is best to boost hair net sales but in turn that was a big flop it didn't work so he had to come up with a new idea

something maybe a little shady, okay? He sprinkled in a little bit of his trademark propaganda spice, you could say. And instead of trying to make long hair happen, he decides to use a more powerful weapon, fear. Oh yeah, fear always works. When in doubt, scare 'em. One thing Eddie knew for sure was that if you scare people into doing something, it works every time.

Working for the government seems to have unlocked something in him. Like he realized people just want to protect themselves and be safe. So if you scare them, they will probably do what you say. Okay, so how do you scare people with hairnets, right? Because that's the least scary thing I could think of. So Eddie consults with some experts and they tell him fact-finding.

The human head sheds about 150 hairs per day. Now, don't freak out. It's normal, okay? Totally normal. But Eddie thought, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm. What happens if like that hair gets in your food or like something?

contamination, right? Like we you could pick out the hair but we could do something better, right? Also at the same time something was happening within the workplace, machines were starting to show up in factories. Now if you remember back to like the triangle shirt waste episode or more recently the Gilded Age, you know that these machines were causing accidents every day. People were getting hurt, people were dying,

It was brutal, okay? So this ends up being a light bulb moment for Eddie. Eddie's thinking to himself, wouldn't it suck so hard if your hair got stuck in one of the machines? What if they use the hairnet to keep the hair out of the face and out of the machine? Sounds like a hairnet could save your whole life, doesn't it? So now he's got two things to work with. One, you should be afraid of hair in your food.

And two, you should be afraid of getting scalped at work. Right off, bald. And there we have it, baby. For the low, low price of one hairnet,

You too can save your own life. That's how he was going to market it. Also, Eddie introduced to everybody that hair in your food is really gross. There was no science behind it, which is kind of odd, right? There probably is some science behind it, I hope, by now. But at the time, Eddie was just telling everyone hair in your food's gross. And everyone just believed it. Anyways, Eddie also went as far as hiring a fashion expert to say that the hairnet gave women a cool, fashionable look.

You know, because at the end of the day, women just want to look good. And Eddie knew that. So he's like, we're going to tell women that this is going to make them look so good, like a Greek goddess. Oh, yeah. Hello, hairnet. I mean, this guy is leaving no stone unturned. And it worked.

So Eddie used his homie hookup at the U.S. government and got several states to pass laws requiring factory workers and female food service employees to wear hairnets. So needless to say, this advertising campaign was a huge success. If you ever worked in like the food industry, would you have to wear on your head, bitch? Or on your beard? A hairnet? Thanks, Eddie. Thanks.

Wow. Anyways, hairnets ended up becoming essential for millions of restaurant and factory workers across the nation. So this gave Eddie Jesus status.

Like he was untouchable. Everybody was like, holy shit, this Eddie guy, he freaking got everyone on hairnets. Like if you could sell hairnets, I don't know, man. I think you could sell anything, right? And word starts to travel pretty quickly just around the businesses, the corporations.

And everyone's talking like, if your company needs a boost, Eddie is your guy. Eddie, let's be honest here. It was going to his head, okay? Because he's like, wow, I just changed a bunch of people's minds about hairnets. And if I can change people's minds about the hairnet, like what else can I change people's minds about? Especially women. He got them to buy into safety, but could he get them to buy into empowerment? I play with my nails too much. I gotta stop.

Soon, one of the biggest companies in the United States at the time gives him a little ring. Ring, ring, ring, ring, ring. You know, you get it. Phone. Guess what company that is?

I'm smoking a cigarette, if you don't know. A company called Lucky Strike, the OG cigarette. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

This is an ad by BetterHelp. What?

What are your self-care non-negotiables? The things you know make you feel better, even when it's impossible to make time for them. Like that workout you try to squeeze in between kids' activities, work, and everything else you have going on, and before you know it, it gets pushed to tomorrow.

Sound familiar? But it's the moments when you feel like you have no time for yourself when those non-negotiables are more important than ever. Those are the things that keep you strong, healthy, motivated, and prepared to take on everything life demands of you. So why not make therapy one of them?

Thanks, HelloFresh.

In 1928, the brand Lucky Strike was killing it, okay? They were the number one cigarette company in the United States. These cigarettes were being lit up and smoked by men all across the country, but that was also the problem.

Lucky Strikes were really only being smoked by men. Smoking a pancake, smoking a blitz. You know, the company knew they could make way more money if they tapped into a market that was untouched by every tobacco company in the country. A market that would guarantee them millions

upon millions more customers if they could just convince them that it was okay to smoke. That market, well maybe you can guess it, they went straight to the source. Babies. I'm just kidding. Do you guys remember that video of that toddler who was smoking cigarettes, just hanging out? He was like smoking like four, it was like, it went viral for, is he doing okay? Has anyone checked up on him? I hope he's good.

Anyway, the real market that Lucky Strike needed to tap into, or at least wanted, was

was women. The problem was smoking. Smoking as a woman was heavily frowned upon in society, especially in public, okay? Society viewed women smoking in public as a sign that you had loose morals and you should know better. Even a few years earlier, a woman, she had gotten arrested and tossed into jail for 30 days for smoking in public. I mean, it's fine if a man smokes in public, but you?

You little hussy. So Lucky Strike realized in order to cash in on the lady market, they would need to literally change how society viewed women smoking. And how do you do that? Like what's step one? This is important because you have to change people's perception on a huge scale. And well, if you can sell a hairnet, then they knew there's only one man for the job. It's that Eddie. Eddie.

Eddie. Okay, so Eddie was ready to take a little page out of Coca-Cola's book to get into women's brains. So we did an episode on Coca-Cola, if you remember, but Coke was the first company to use a celebrity in their ads. Her name was Hilda Clark and it was very successful to have a celebrity posing with a Coca-Cola, huge hit, great success. So Eddie is like, "Hey, let's hop on that bandwagon."

And he decides to reach out to a bunch of female celebrities at the time. I'm talking Betty Davis, Joan Crawford. Sorry, girl, not you. The actual famous one. Betty Grable. I mean, golden age of Hollywood women, okay? Glitz, glam. People were loving it. Well, they loved Hollywood. So Eddie knew, like...

There's something here. So Eddie got Lucky Strike to pay them something like $75,000 a year to endorse the brand, to just like smoke or hold it or something, you know? And this was a huge deal. First of all, it was a brilliant idea at the time, having huge celebrities promote a product. Today, it's not that shocking to us because we see it all the time, right, on social media. But back then...

Wow. Wow. So he got these women photographed with cigarettes, sexily dangling out of like their mouth, smoking, being mysterious with the cigarette. It was seen as like kind of powerful too. And guess what? It started to work. Women started buying cigarettes like crazy. But the campaign didn't stop there. Oh, nay, nay, nay.

Eddie and all the other guys in charge hired a psychiatrist to tell them the age-old question, what do women want? You know, our first thought is maybe we should ask a woman. No, of course not. They're not going to ask a woman. They know what we want better than what we want. So the psychologists, men psychologists, essentially tell them women want to be empowered. In 1920, a

women gained the right to vote, but I mean, that didn't mean things were all great and dandy, you know? There were still huge biases against women. For example, let's say like you're, let's say you're a woman, great. So let's say you're a woman and you got pregnant.

Well, back then you could get fired from your job. Okay, not cool. Back then you couldn't have your own passport or credit cards. And the worst one of all, you weren't even allowed to wear pants. You know, could you imagine wearing dresses every day?

"My thighs rub together too much. "The rashes, oh. "It's not like you can use baby powder. "That's just gonna kill you. "Why do they wanna kill us?" Anyways, so Eddie's like, "Let's empower women. "Let's do it. "They wanna vote. "They wanna smoke.

So, let's make them feel like they have the same rights as the men. You might be thinking, "Oh hell yeah! Did Eddie team up with the government and get them to change the laws like he did for the hairnets?" No, of course not. That's too much work. He was like, "Guys, we don't have to change the laws to empower women.

We just have to make women think they are empowering themselves and sticking it to the man by encouraging them to go against social norms for the sake of women's rights. So Eddie decides to take advantage of the New York Easter parade that spring.

and he used this event for a little free publicity. You see what he did? He hired a bunch of beauty queens, very beautiful women. Now these women were like the picture of femininity at the time. And he had these women stand in the parade, gorgeous, beautiful, ooh, right? And guess what they did? They pulled out a pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes and smoked them.

triumphantly. And people photographed the crap out of this because first of all, a woman smoking in public was like running through a church naked or something, you know? Like heads were exploding left and right. Beautiful woman smoking? Oh, shit. You know, just...

didn't make sense. But Eddie's plan ended up paying off because after everyone saw these upstanding beauty queens smoking on television and in the news, smoking Lucky Strikes became a symbol of defiance and power. A woman smoking a Lucky Strike wasn't just smoking a plain old cigarette. Nay nay, she was lighting a torch of freedom. That's literally how Eddie branded it. Torches of freedom.

torches of, I can't, yeah, I mean, it's kind of fun. I get it. It's like, "Light 'em up, stick up your middle finger, little man." Lucky Strike ran ads that said, "Women are free, and ancient prejudice has been removed." For cigarettes. And women were like, "Fuck yeah!" You know? And just like that, baby,

Society got over the whole "you're a whore if you smoke" thing. Wild. Almost overnight, Lucky Strike gained 4 million new smokers.

Snaps. I mean, he killed it. Come on. Yeah, smoking's bad, but he killed that. It honestly kind of reminds me of Crocs. In the beginning, everybody was like roasting Crocs and saying how ugly they were, remember? And then one day we logged onto social media and like supermodels and rappers were all wearing them. And then like everybody started wearing them. And I have some, I don't even know why. I don't even know where they came from. They just appeared one day. I'm like, I have Crocs. I don't know why, you know?

So after this, Eddie's advertising techniques became like the standard for every marketing department. I mean, everyone wanted to be like Eddie. Every company wanted their own Eddie.

And Eddie was just a shit. He used hairnets and cigarettes. He killed it, man. So women were feeling sexy and empowered thanks to good old Eddie, but not for long because pretty soon companies realized that their customers wanted something else, even more than they wanted empowerment, even more than they wanted a cold drink on a hot day. The customers wanted sex. You heard me right.

So just like your favorite podcast, Progressive will be with you 24, 7, 365 days a year. So you're protected no matter what. Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive.

Now let's get back to our story.

Now, you might have heard this before. It's a phrase, sex sells, you know. But in case you haven't, it's a type of advertising technique. There have been studies that show when our brains see something erotic, it releases good chemicals like dopamine, serotonin, and adrenaline. Oh yeah, when you see a little, when you see a little titty, when you see a little, uh.

You know, our brain is like, I mean, this isn't new information. The concept of sex sells actually like goes all the way back to the 1870s when another cigarette company or tobacco company called Pearl Tobacco, they did something absolutely scandalous and they put a painting of a naked lady on their packages. Now, this was pretty tasteful.

when you look at it now, okay? And honestly, it almost looked like just a beautiful painting of Venus coming out of the shell. But back then,

It was kind of like, "Mmm." You know? Pretty soon after, another cigarette company called Duke & Sons jumped on the bandwagon and started putting collectible cards of famous women inside of their packaging. So it was like a little Pokemon, you know? You had to collect them all. And some of the poses were very sexually suggestive. There's one where it shows a woman dressed up in a little fairy costume.

Love a good fantasy. And these cute little cards seem to really work because Duke went from selling 30 million cigarettes in 1883 to 100 million just the next year, proving that showing a little skin can be a big win. That's wild when you think about it, just showing a little skin. You don't even have to be naked, just show a little shoulder. Oh, my shoulder, oh.

Okay, but sex sells really took off in the 20th century thanks to the advancements in advertising in print and also we can't forget Eddie Bernays advertising techniques. And guys you'll never guess the ad that changed everything. The ad that made America wet. So wet. America is so wet. No it wasn't the Hitachi magic wand which you think it would be. It was actually for um a bar of soap.

Yeah! Oh yeah. Advertising got very dirty to sell cleaning products, which honestly is very fitting, right? In 1920s, the Woodbury Soap Company, they rolled out these ads that ran in popular magazines that featured paintings of young couples romantically involved. It was like a lover's embrace and the woman is like fawning over the man's presence.

And the man in the photo or the picture, he was just a man who represented masculinity. And not just any man, he was a man who served his country, who's always wearing a uniform. So not only are they selling soap, but they're also kind of saying that men in uniform are attractive and to be desired and like, ah!

I need to take a selfie, bah! You know, that's what it looked like to me based off my observation. Now, this was a time before commercials and everything. So they really had to be, they being the advertisers, the people who actually wrote the advertisers, they had to be really creative with their words.

And the words were seductive, intimate. Most importantly, they were selling a story, a story about your aspiration. If you buy our product, you too can have this life. Here, I'll read you one of these ads. It's beautiful. This ad is called Miracle at Midnight. And let me remind you, this is for soap.

Okay? "Breathless, you unmask. He takes you in his arms. A searchlight pierces your secret heart. And plain as day, you see love walk right in. He whispers that it's you he wants forever and ever. Lovely as you are tonight." And quote, "Yeah, bitch. Did you hear anything about soap? Me neither, but I want it." Well, this is where you start to see ass getting really spicy.

And instead of telling their audience about the product or what it can do, they don't give a shit about that. The new thing to do was to make the customers feel like they were buying more than just a product. They're buying a lifestyle. They're buying sexual arousal. Or in this case, a sexy little softcore porn moment with a handsome soldier. Do you guys remember those Carl's Jr commercials with Paris Hilton washing the car while eating the burger?

Yeah, that's how we all eat hamburgers. Now we knew it had nothing to do about burgers. It was just sex. It was hot. It was soap, right? But the message is the same. This product will make you hot and may even get you laid. That's like just the goal, right? I think that Carl's Jr. one actually pissed a lot of people off from what I remember.

That was a good ad though because it got people talking. Woodbury soap wasn't done though because they came out with another banger in the 1930s.

They became one of the first American companies to use nudity in print ads. Yeah, in the 1930s. They did that shit. These spicy little pictures were usually women in the shower or at the pool, and they were strategically covering their titties and like their hoo-hahs, you know? And in the ads, it promised to deliver filtered sunshine, which is kind of okay, you know?

You know? And how could you get this? Well, you could achieve this by using their soap, of course. This was a huge shift in the world of advertising because it went from sexually suggestive advertisements to straight up nudity to sell a product.

But like that famous quote goes, a picture is worth a thousand words and pictures can be very influential. So instead of describing boring old soap, Woodbury could just show you like a beautiful image, tie the product to the image and leave the consumer to connect the dots. Sexy lady, soap. Ah yes, I'm just one bar of soap away from being a sexy lady.

I kind of feel that way about foundations and concealers. Like I always buy foundations and concealers because I swear it's going to make me like this hot bitch. But like, I'm still me.

You know? So when you really think about it, I mean, these ads could really be selling anything, right? We know it's a soap ad because there's a picture of soap and the word Woodbury at the bottom. But couldn't you just replace that with anything? Bingo, bitch. Bingo. This is where we enter the era of companies selling a lifestyle, aka this could be you if you buy our product.

This is when it starts to get nasty, you know? By the mid-1900s, it was almost like it didn't matter what your product could do or if it was really any good. It mattered how the advertisement could make you feel, right? And this is exactly the kind of tricks that were used to make diamond engagement rings a thing. Ooh!

Now you're probably thinking, wait, what? Engagement rings weren't always diamonds. No, sweaty. The only reason you have a whole Pinterest board of diamond engagement rings is because...

Visit BetterHelp.com slash Dark History today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash Dark History. Now let's get back to the story. Welcome to the 1940s. Naked ladies are selling you soap.

Everyone's smoking. Honestly, seems like a great time. And diamonds are dirt cheap compared to today. So what the hell happened, right? Because diamonds are not dirt cheap. Well, there's this company called De Beers, which...

it makes me roll my eyes because it's such a missed opportunity to sell alcohol right? De Beers they sell freaking diamonds, whatever. Anyway so this company they own up to 90% of the world's supply of the world's diamonds but they were very sneaky and they kept it a secret. So think of it like this, De Beers this company they have all these diamonds, they're cheap,

They have a bunch, they can't sell them. Nobody wanted them. They weren't rare. Plus they're clear, they're boring, they're basic. So the company is like, nobody wants these. How do we make them want these? We have so many, it's just a waste. So De Beers hires an advertising firm to help make Diamonds the new it girl in the rock world. So in 1948, De Beers rolls out their famous album,

A Diamond is Forever campaign. Diamonds are forever! Yes. Yes. Yes. And after this campaign, the story of engagement rings was forever changed. So first, De Beers jacked up the prices of the diamonds by claiming that diamonds were extremely rare and difficult to get, which is line number one. Difficult to get?

Sure, I mean, I can't get one in my backyard, you know, but rare? Ugh, no, not so much. In fact, rubies, emeralds, and sapphires are all more rare than diamonds. And they knew this, De Beers, they knew this. But as we know, feelings can be really powerful in pushing consumers to buy a product. I mean, you mess with someone's emotions.

That's how they get you. And the De Beers Company knew that, so they exploited one of our most basic and simple emotions: love. And baby, we love love. We love love, right? And using newspapers, magazines, movies, and even going across the country giving lectures at high schools,

De Beers' representatives convinced America that diamonds equaled love. They pushed, baby, they pushed hard. And not only that, the bigger and more expensive the diamond meant a stronger, more loving relationship. They even came up with their own statistic, maybe you've heard of it before, about how a proper engagement ring should cost about three months of your salary.

Which, side note, I didn't know that was a thing. I've never heard that before. Until we started doing research for this story and I was like, you better not be spending three months of your salary on a freaking ring, you guys. Are you guys doing this? I'm not judging, but come on. Are you okay? That's a lot of money for a ring.

Slime, whatever. I mean, do what you want to your life. And if you have the money, that's fine. But I hope you're not going into debt over a ring. You know, like that makes me sad. And plus it's just like, we kind of been conditioned to think it's this old ancient tradition, but no.

De Beers just had some extra stock and they needed to make some money. That's what it comes down to. But this worked because people started to believe the hype that diamonds were not only highly valuable, but the ultimate way to express your love. And again, you love love, right? And diamonds equal love, right? They knew that. They messed with us. They're playing with us.

It makes me sick. Hey, but do you wanna know a fun fact though? This is actually super handy. This could actually save your life, okay? I think I learned it on Oprah or something. Diamonds can literally save your life. I hope you're never in this situation, but if you're in a car and let's say you drive into the lake, bless your soul, you're going down, water rising, surrounding you. Guess what? If you have a real diamond, the diamond can break the window, yep.

Boom, break the window, get out, save your life. I'm not kidding. That would be a really bad time to find out that it wasn't a real diamond, but if it is a real diamond, it will break the windshield. They should really lean into that for an ad. Diamonds can save your life. Like that would. Just have a diamond. If you have a diamond on deck, just keep it in your car. You know, you're welcome. Subscribe for more life saving information. Anyways, so that's the one thing that's nice about diamonds, I guess.

They could break a windshield. Oh no. I hope I didn't just give people the knowledge to start breaking into windshields. No.

So De Beers teamed up with Hollywood to put diamond ads on the big screen, like the James Bond movie, Diamonds Are Forever, right? And they got the money to fork out like whatever these people want so they could get diamonds in front of an audience, right? And if you see James Bond being all sexy and hot with talking about diamonds, like it's so rude, right? It's so rude.

Anyways, ads for De Beers engagement rings usually shows like a picture of young lovers getting married in beautiful locations or on sexy little honeymoons. And De Beers has convinced the American public that diamonds were the perfect stone for an engagement ring because of allegedly...

how strong they were compared to other gemstones. I mean, they're pretty much telling you like, do you want a man to prove he loves you by spending a stupid amount of money or not?

I mean, yes, of course you do, you know? Nothing wrong with that. But just keep in mind, someone told us to think that way. Don't go into debt over it, you know? But what I'm getting at is how scary advertising is because this shows how powerful this one campaign was, this one about diamonds. And we all believed it.

I mean, I always thought diamonds were so expensive, like it meant luxury, money. It's a status thing, right? But in reality, they're not even that special. You've been called out to beers.

Unless you want to gift me some diamonds, I'll take it, you know? Anyway, the whole rebrand really pays off for De Beers. To this day, A Diamond is Forever is known as the most successful ad campaign ever. Ever. Before, something like 10% of engagement rings contained diamonds. But after this campaign ran in 1948, diamond sales went bonkers. Today,

87% of Americans report that they prefer diamonds for an engagement ring. You might not even know the brand De Beers, but if you've ever thought about wanting a diamond engagement ring, you're doing exactly what they want. Spooky!

when you really think about it, right? But I guess at the end of the day, a diamond ring is a status symbol, just like a designer bag or private jet, I don't know. So, and again, like I'm not judging if you have a diamond ring or anything, do what you want, get what you love, right? I'm just giving you the factual information that they fooled us into thinking, you know, it's rare.

Damn it. Anyway, so over time, companies have just gotten better and better at exploiting basic human emotions. They try convincing us, if you don't buy this thing, how are you supposed to show someone you love them? Which is a gigantic lie, you know? Mm-mm, mm-mm-mm. What are we gonna do about this? Diamonds are forever!

Excuse me. One big thing to know is that advertising is attached to whatever technology is hot at the time. And the thing about technology now is that it's literally everywhere. Back in the day, back in the olden days, radio and magazine ads were everything. But after World War II, the United States was on like a major upswing. People could afford cars. They could buy a house.

they would get the Sears catalog and be able to buy stuff in there on like a single salary. I know. What is that like? So the American middle class shows up on the scene and they're just like,

living it up, right? Buying stuff. And then you know her, you love her, you're probably watching her right now. I'm talking about the television. The television comes onto the scene. The boob tube, as some people call it, which I learned while researching today's story that they didn't call it the boob tube because there was boobs on TV. No.

Boob is another word of saying dummy. And some people believe that if you watch too much TV, they would become a giant dummy. Boob-dub. How come women's parts are always like an insult? You know, boob, why is boob dumb? Boob gives life. Boob feeds babies. You like boobs. Why are we shaming them? That's not the point. Okay, look.

It didn't matter though. Boob tube didn't matter. If it made you dumb, didn't matter. People wanted one. Everybody wanted a TV. It was new. It was exciting. It was technology. It was the freaking future. But before World War II, there was only a few thousand Americans who owned a television. And by 1955, it was said that half of the country had one in their home. I mean, I don't know about you, but I think that's a big jump. You know what I'm saying? So this had companies...

salivating. Why? Because now they could promote their products directly to their consumer in the comfort of their own home, visually. So think about how vulnerable you are on the couch. You're probably there, you got no pants on, looking like a mess, and like companies are showing up like, "You need this!"

You need this to be beautiful. It's like, yeah. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customer surveyed who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary. Discounts not available in all states and situations. Companies knew that. They knew it and they got you. So the rise of television, more people are tuning in, more people are watching it. And the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, which has been around for freaking ever. And also the Super Bowl. We're bringing in millions of viewers.

Millions of people were watching this and advertisers realized that they could get maximum exposure on television. They don't have to worry about where to put a billboard or like who buys what magazine. Everybody was watching TV. So for example, the Super Bowl in 1990 had 80 million viewers, which is like insanity.

So companies and advertisers are seeing this thinking like jackpot. We just got to get in front of these people, right? But the thing about the Super Bowl is that it's only so long. Not every company can get a spot, right? So bidding wars begin to get a hold of those coveted advertising slots. The price of airtime goes up and up and up and bitch, bitch.

Companies were paying essentially like $1.8 million for a 30 second commercial. Where's that money going? I want to know.

And it's always for something stupid like beer. And people are gonna buy it anyways. I don't know, give me an ad for something I haven't seen. But what I'm getting at is this was a hot commodity. Okay, you wanted one of these spots. TV owned the advertising game for quite some time until one thing exploded onto the scene in the 90s. I'm not talking about jizz. I'm talking about the dial-up, baby. The World Wide Web. The www.aol.com.

Mm-hmm. www.geocities.com. W, sorry. Let me ask you guys something. A little personal question. Get in real close. It's a very intimate question I'm about to ask you. Do you ever feel like somebody's watching you? She's right there. Blink twice if you need help. I need help.

Anyways, so no, not in like your backyard, like in a stalker way. I mean being stalked online by companies. I know everyone can relate to this. You're talking to your friend. Your friend's telling you like, oh my God, I bought this cool little bug zapper thing. This literally just happened to me like the other day. I got this bug zapper thing. It zaps the bug bite, whatever. And like 20 minutes later, boom, there's a little advertisement for it on your social media.

And it's like, what the hell you guys? Are you listening? Yes, I will buy the thing, but like on my own terms, the ads I get on my social media are wild. Sometimes I feel like

somebody like implanted a tracking device in my brain and it's just like how do they figure this shit out? It's creepy, it makes me uncomfortable, but I'm addicted so it's like you know. But it does it gets you thinking like how are companies doing this? It's very complicated how they do this so I'm giving you the the light version okay. So let me just tell you this straight up and everyone should know this. You are indeed being stalked okay. Facts.

Companies are getting better at knowing what we want, what we're looking at, what we're doing. They're tracking everything, okay, on your phone, your computer. Anything with technology or like connects to the internet, they're tracking your ass. Remember back in the day with like TV and stuff before the internet? Everyone used to see and hear the same ads, right? One of my favorites was J-E-L-L-O. It's a lie.

Yeah, I like that one. But now ads are very sneaky. They're everywhere, everywhere, especially on your social media. And they're trying really hard to not look like ads. The first president of Facebook actually called social media, I quote, social validation feedback loop.

Meaning big companies like Instagram and TikTok, they learn exactly what we want and then they use that information to keep us scrolling, keeps us on the app longer. And also because it feels like the app was made just for you.

And guess what? It was made just for you. This is when things get real complicated because it went from like advertisements that we all saw to now personalized advertisements. There's this little man who lives in your phone. His name is Al Gore Rhythm. You know, Mr. Rhythm. He's keeping track of anything and everything you're doing. Yeah, Mr. Rhythm.

I'm looking at you. So one ad that always follows me everywhere is freaking Revolve. Yeah, I'm calling them out by name. Revolve. Okay, you guys harass me, okay? You need to stop it. 'Cause like, I'll be looking at shoes or something, guess what? Those shoes are literally following me all over the place. I'll be on like ancestry.com like, "Oh, well, my great grandmother tried..." Oh, Revolve. Like, it's like, leave me alone. You know, I don't want shoes.

oh no how my grandma died you know maybe you were looking up those engagement rings barbara and then everywhere you go you see them every website there's engagement rings it just follows you tracks your every move but what are you supposed to do delete instagram

I know that's like the realistic answer, but you're not going to. I want to know what my friends are eating for dinner. And I also want to show everyone how good I look today. And that's the whole point. These social media platforms, they want to keep you on the platform. You're addicted to it because of those chemicals like we mentioned earlier with the sex cells. It's the same thing.

You get serotonin, adrenaline, and dopamine hits when you're scrolling on social media and getting fed targeted ads. And that's all done on purpose because when it comes to digital advertising today, tracking is everything. Where you drive, what you drive, when you drive, where you shop, how often you shop, what you buy. I mean, literally everything. And a lot of people don't even realize how much...

Advertisers are following us. If you're carrying your phone with you, it's fair game, really. The worst part is when you really sit down and think about everything that you confessed to Google, right? We tell Google our deepest, darkest secrets, fantasies, whatever.

And most of us would probably be very embarrassed if other people found out what we were Googling. You know, like last night I was up Googling, who gave me this purple rash? I was like, Google's supposed to know, I don't know.

but beats me. Well, reports say that millions of people trust Google with their secrets more than their spouse. And I totally get it. I get it. Google doesn't judge. No, she does not. Most importantly, you assume that it's private, like writing in your diary, but it's not, it's not. Every damn thing you do in search online is tracked and then turned into data that they then use to sell you shit.

which this part gets a little confusing because like data, it doesn't get confusing. It's actually quite simple.

Let me just explain. Let's say you're shopping for a blue light to do some like undercover ancient ghost splooge in your old ass house. In other words, I bought a blue light because I wanted to see if there was like jizz in my house. Facts. Okay, look, I did. But look, there were so many blue light options and I was like, which one's the best? I don't know. So I got overwhelmed and I exited out over the next couple of days.

Bitch, all of the ads everywhere were about blue lights, orange lights, black lights, ghost lights, strobe lights, flashlights, fleshlights. I was like, damn, I didn't know that there were so many options, okay? And now I was just like,

too overwhelmed. There's ads in your Instagram reels. You're getting those annoying pop-ups. Your friends are getting ads because the company is really living on a prayer, hoping your friend will buy the product or maybe, I don't know, they'll buy it and then recommend it to you or something, you know? So this actually has a name. It's called poll advertising. This is a little fun little snippet. It's advertising that is pulling you towards a product like a lasso. I

Like a fishing line, you know? But it's different from like a billboard or a magazine ad where a company pushes out a product in hopes that you see it, which totally makes sense when you think of it like that. They're trying to pull you in.

versus a billboard is just pushing a product out. Plus the billboard doesn't follow you home at night, right? And before we leave this section, I just need to say, if something is free to use online, be very suspish. All companies have to make money somehow. And all those free websites and free apps that we use, yeah, they're making money off of us. Like Instagram, that's a free app.

So how in the hell did they make like $30 billion last year if the app is free? Because we paid for the app, not with our money, but with our data.

They're selling your Google searches, your app downloads, where you're driving, what time you leave the house, how many Starbucks you pass. They're selling all of that information to advertisers and we're not the only ones that are watching online. One of the biggest and most valuable audiences, the children.

But what about the children? Yeah, the children. They are targeted harder than anybody else. Millions of kids under the age of 18 use social media. Actually, the company that owns Instagram, Meta, just got sued for taking advantage of the children.

In the UK, not here, 'cause we don't care. Just a little while ago, when kids signed up for Instagram, their accounts were automatically set as public, so anyone could view their profile. Besides the pervs coming out to play, it also meant that these kids were a goldmine to companies because they could just bombard them with ads.

You gotta get 'em young, penetrate those brains. Now a lot of us adults know when and like how to keep scrolling when we see those ads, right? But kids, they don't know any better. They don't know that it's an ad. They just don't realize it like we do, okay? Then once they click, their phone numbers and their emails and personal information were getting collected and then things were getting really dangerous. And for once, Instagram actually got in trouble for it in Europe.

because here in America they don't give a shit. I guess parents in Europe sued Instagram for violating the hell out of child privacy laws and like good for the parents, good, because the courts also were behind them, they agreed, and now Instagram is on the hook for a 400 million dollar fine and had to find ways to keep kids safe.

Yeah. So I'm just going to go ahead and say, I don't trust them. I mean, they did in Europe, but they're not going to do it here. So it's like, do they care? No, they don't. They never did. They care about money and our data. And then don't even get me started on TikTok. TikTok is so dangerous. And I know nobody likes to hear it because it's such a fun app.

but they are so bad. They also got hit with millions of dollars in fines for violating the privacy of kids just so they could sell ads. And then in 2021, TikTok made about $4 billion in advertising revenue. And bitch, this is just the tip of the stalker iceberg because you don't even need an account for TikTok to track you. So has a friend ever sent you a link to a TikTok? Well, if you clicked and you watched it, they've gathered some information on you.

Oh yeah, you don't even need an account. They scanned your photos, they scanned... They gotcha bitch. But here's the thing, pretty much every website does this. Every single website you go to, they do this. The minute you land on their page, they are taking notes on you. You are the product. You are how they make money. Now I know what you're thinking like, "But I bought a ton of stuff from social media that I love. And was that because I found it or was it because it was served to me?"

And I don't know. I don't know. I'm just some girl on the internet, you know? But what I do know is that the pickle grabber I bought on Instagram, it lets me grab the pickles without getting the juice on my fingers. Yeah, it's really great. That was a good one. Thanks. I don't like pickle fingers, you know? But I love a pickle.

So some of you are probably like, okay, whatever, whatever about all this, but you should be concerned about your data because it's so much more valuable than you think. More than any one company would admit. No one would admit that you entering your information into an app is like 12,000 people staring into your living room window while you think you're alone.

Advertising started as something we saw when we drove by and like that was it. It was on a billboard. But now it literally follows us everywhere. It just doesn't stop. There's no boundaries. We're safe nowhere. And even these smart TVs and bullshit, like the smart refrigerators, give me a fucking break. You don't need to know how many times like I'm buying milk and stuff. You know, like it's just, it's intrusive. Oh my God. That was a good word. Intrusive. Intrusive.

And Joseph. And Joseph. So, listen to me. Advertising doesn't have to be the bad guy here, right? Good things come from advertising. Small businesses wouldn't normally get exposure to so many people without social media advertising. Or maybe like, you wouldn't have found that really cool new hot dog place down the street without a targeted ad. It's not 100% a bad thing.

But as more of our lives move online, it's easier and it's going to be easier to track every single thing that we do and think. They're predicting what we're thinking and it's fucking creepy. So it's more important than ever to ask ourselves, is this product that's being advertised to us something we truly want? Or is this something...

someone else has convinced you that you want. It's, you know, like, hello, diamond engagement rings. Are they doing that with something else? Sometimes it's like, you know, when you see like an advertisement for like a new show and it's like, I fucking get it. Like, I'm not going to watch your show because you keep advertising it to me. I'm not going to watch it. I guess there's no ending to that story. It's just annoying. You know, I don't know about you guys, but I feel like

something that we should be talking about with one another is getting laws in place to protect us and our data. It feels like things are getting very out of control. And if you're going to sell my data and information,

I think you should pay me, bitch. Fuck you. Pay me. It's mine. I made it. That's my data. You know? Yeah, we should be demanding. Our data is worth a lot of money. We sold our souls. We, I don't know.

We need to think about this and start marinating on some ideas, okay? I don't think we need to get rid of the advertising thing, but there needs to be some kind of boundary in place, right? We should be a little concerned. So, Eddie Bernay, he taught companies how to manipulate people into buying things that they think they need. So right from the start, advertising has always been deceptive. I mean, it's always kind of been propaganda.

It's been a predator taking advantage of people. And it's almost like he predicted all of this data advertising was going to happen, honestly. I mean, there's no sign of that stopping anytime soon. The global ad industry brings in about $800 billion right now, so you think they're going to stop? I'm probably going to get murdered. Watch. And it's only going to get bigger. It's expected to hit...

like a trillion dollars by 2025, I am in the wrong industry, you know? Now I'm gonna leave you with a quote from Eddie Bernays book which is literally called propaganda. He said quote, "Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes

formed are ideas suggested largely by men we have never heard of." Snaps, daddy, snaps. Now don't get all conspiracy theory on me. I'm talking about advertising here. Let's just, you know, but it's true. These people in charge are telling us what to buy, what to think, what we want. It's disgusting. I feel violated. I feel penetrated by ads.

So what I'm getting at is stay safe out there and honestly be suspicious of who you give your information to. Easier said than done. I totally get it. I'll scroll on TikTok for hours. So annoying. And the next thing you know, I come out like, who's the president? Where am I? You know, it's gross. We're disgusting. I'm a slut.

Well everyone, thank you for learning with me today. Remember, don't be afraid to ask questions to get the whole story and stay curious because we deserve that and I think we deserve to know what's really going on, right De Beers?

You wanna talk about it, DeBeers? You wanna say something for yourself, DeBeers? I'd love to hear it. I'd love to hear your guys' reaction to today's story, so make sure to use the hashtag darkhistory over on social media so I can follow along. Also, join me over on my YouTube where you can watch these episodes on Thursday after the podcast airs. And while you're there, don't forget to check out Murder, Mystery, and Makeup. Yay! I hope you have a really good day today. You make good choices. Remember, if you're drowning in a car,

look for the diamond ring. And if you don't have one, bon voyage. Talk to you next week. Goodbye. I hope you don't die in a car. That'd suck. Dark History is an Audioboom original. This podcast is executive produced by Bailey Sarian, Junya McNeely from 3Arts, Kevin Grush, and Claire Turner from Maiden Network.

writers Katie Burris, Alison Filobos, Joey Scaluzzo, and me, Bailey Sarian. Shot and edited by Tafadzwa Namarundwe and Hannah Bacher. Research provided by Xander Elmore and the Dark History Researcher Team. Special thanks to our expert, Jeff Richards. And I'm your host, Bailey Sarian. Say bye, Joan. Diamonds are forever on!

65: How did we go from selling soap to selling our souls? 55:52 Share

Dark History

Chapters

Shownotes Transcript

65: How did we go from selling soap to selling our souls?