Organizations and Markets

| Peter Klein |

One of my favorite local restaurants sits next to a Sherwin-Williams paint store. When leaving the restaurant I always pause to gaze upon the Sherwin-Williams logo. A paint can dumping red ooze over the planet’s surface — you can’t get more politically incorrect than that! There’s even a tagline, “Cover the Earth,” in case you miss the point. In today’s environmentally sensitive age this logo is the Anti-Green. It screams: synthetic, industrial, man-made, unnatural. I love it.

I imagine there’s a lot of pressure on the company to reject the logo, but Sherwin-Williams soldiers on. There’s a brief description, charmingly apologetic, on the “Green Initiatives” page of the company website. “Created in the late 1800s, the logo’s purpose was to represent the company’s desire to help beautify and protect the buildings of the world. It was a symbol of a young company’s enthusiasm, idealism and hope regarding its future and the possibility for achievement that hovered on the nation’s horizon.” In other words, that was a different age, please forgive us. Today it’s simply “a figurative emblem signifying quality, integrity and service.” And no more oily residue!

What other firms have politically incorrect logos? Marlboro of course ditched the Marlboro man long ago. Joe Camel made it to 1997 before being ushered into retirement. Robertson’s kept Golly on its marmalade jars until 2001. Oh, and check out this funny set of politically incorrect ads of yesteryear (Santa smoking Chesterfields, a husband spanking his wife for serving the wrong coffee, a group of servicemen being warned “You can’t beat the Axis if you get VD”).