The Great McXXXX Caramel Shortcake Packaging Swindle?
Dear Customer Service People, Con Artists, Swindlers and Sundry Tricksters:
Please forgive the unprofessional nature of the attached photographs but I was still in shock from opening the aforementioned item.
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Exhibit 2: Interior tray. Size: 21.2cm x 10.0cm x 2.7cm. Volume 572.4cm3
Exhibit 3: Wrapped slice. Size 10.7cm x 3.6cm x 2.4cm
Exhibit 4: Unwrapped slice. Size: 7cm x 2.5cm x 1.7cm. Volume 29.75cm3
I'll ignore the measurements of the redundant plastic wrappers for the moment - the 'wings' add nothing to the volume, are not integral to a wrapping process and appear to be there for no other reason than to give the optical illusion of length.
Size for size there is room for 19.24 slices within the cardboard tray. Or put another way the entire six unwrapped slices take up only 31% of the available volume. At this stage I began to wonder what target market you had in mind with this product:
1. Elderly people with smaller appetites. I mused on this for quite a while but after trying one of your McXXXX Caramel Shortcake Slices I decided it was probably too hard for their teeth and slightly too dry also, unless it's intended to be dunked in tea.
2. Small people. Possible, but there are only six slices. Bashful and Sleepy would have to share a slice and poor Snow White wouldn't get one at all. Perhaps that's how she keeps her figure.
3. Hamsters and other pets of lesser stature. This one has real potential however it was definitely in the supermarket aisle for human foodstuffs so unless it was wilfully misplaced I have to discount this option.
I can only surmise given the paltry proportions of the individual items with respect to the exterior that your company is in fact attempting to con the general public into parting with their hard earned cash in a mistaken belief that the product itself bears a relation to the outsized packaging. Or put another way, 69% of the item in question is entirely superfluous. In this age of recycling fascism your company has decided in volte-face of current green thinking to manufacture a product which has almost 70% waste even before the contents are consumed.
Nope. It has to be a cynical and downright dastardly marketing ploy to swindle us into thinking we're actually about to purchase a product close to the packaging size. Needless to say I will not be buying anything else bearing the McXXXX brand. I only hope the rest of the UXXXX BXXXX portfolio is more honest in its approach to the consumer.
By the way if you want a better visual example of what I'm talking about there's now a video on YouTube entitled 'The Great McXXXX Caramel Shortbread Slice Packaging Swindle?' where the unwrapping and measuring can be seen in greater detail. (my camera's video capabilities are far better than its ability to take static snaps). It's attracting quite a lot of hits however on reflection I think if the word 'con' had been used instead of 'swindle' it would have generated more interest. As you obviously have no shame in marketing these to the public I cannot see you raising any objections to a three minute film of someone unwrapping the goods and placing each separate part next to a ruler. The voice-over makes no judgment call on your manufacturing abilities (though the comments left by others certainly do so) but is purely a verbal record of lengths, breadths and volumes of the items in question. I've left it to others to make their own judgments in the comments below.
Could this be the caramel shortcake's fifteen minutes of (in)fame?
