Egg-vertising: CBS logo in your refrigerators!

[Gifted Gourmet]

NYTimes article

In September, CBS plans to start using a new place to advertise its fall television lineup: your breakfast.  The network plans to announce today that it will place laser imprints of its trademark eye insignia, as well as logos for some of its shows, on eggs...  CBS’s copywriters are referring to the medium as “egg-vertising,” hinting at the wordplay they have in store. The best thing about the egg concept was its intrusiveness. The CBS ads are the first to use imprinting technology developed by a company called EggFusion ... reassure shoppers that egg producers were not placing old eggs in new cartons, so he developed a laser-etching technique to put the expiration date directly on an egg during the washing and grading process. EggFusion started production last year with one egg company, Radlo Foods, which has since produced 30 million Born Free brand farm-raised eggs with etching.

So, folks who either love or hate a new idea, what is your take on this new concept?

Is being intrusive, as the article suggests, a superb marketing concept?

Or is this simply overkill which will drive customers away?

[MarketStEl]

Marshall McLuhan, in his tongue-in-cheeky followup to his book Understanding Media titled The Medium Is The Massage (1967), has a photo of a sunny-side-up egg with a brand logo ("IPC process," IIRC) on its yolk.

Okay, so this is not exactly the same thing, but it's close enough to turn McLuhan's "Good Morning!" from an oddity into a prediction.

I believe McLuhan's picture was meant to express disdain--or at least trepidation--for a world in which everything becomes an advertising vehicle. With this technological development, we have moved one small step closer to that unlovely world, but frankly, most of the damage in this department has been done already, what with sponsorships of just about anything that moves and many things that don't.

Edited to replace the word "illustration" with "photo." In this case, the distinction is significant.

Edited July 17, 2006 by MarketStEl (log)

[Daniel]

In my head I see the schmuck who is going to sue CBS for Salmonella poisoning..

Edited July 17, 2006 by Daniel (log)

[JasonZ]

In the EU, egg shells are imprinted (soy based ink, which can be washed off) with the "good before" date and the name of the farm from which the eggs came ... In the US, a firm is proposing to laser etch information on "lay date", source, etc. on eggs along with an ID number so a consumer could trace the egg's jouney from chicken to store ... BUT this firm is also proposing to sell "advertising space" on eggs to firms interested in reaching consumers ... and can apparently target ads to local areas!!

Giving freshness info is a great idea ... but do you want to be reading ads on your eggs?

Article source (About.com) -- BTW, this article was competing with National Underwear Day!!!

About.com on Egg Adverts

What do you think?

JasonZ

[Heidi the Pilgrim]

In the EU, egg shells are imprinted (soy based ink, which can be washed off) with the "good before" date and the name of the farm from which the eggs came ... In the US, a firm is proposing to laser etch information on "lay date", source, etc. on eggs along with an ID number so a consumer could trace the egg's jouney from chicken to store ... BUT this firm is also proposing to sell "advertising space" on eggs to firms interested in reaching consumers ... and can apparently target ads to local areas!!

Giving freshness info is a great idea ... but do you want to be reading ads on your eggs?

I think geez Louise, advertising goons, leave me alone! I hate going to the theater now because you get blasted with 20 minutes worth of commercials at a painfully high volume before a movie - now it's going to be on my eggs? What's next, sound chips that play commercials when you open the box?

[chow guy]

I find the concept disgusting. Shame on CBS!

[Sugarella]

Doesn't everyone open the carton to check for cracks before buying? If I saw ads I'd deliberately buy the other brand......

[Blue_Egg_Farmer]

Aside form the advertising aspect, the more steps and the more complicated they make getting the egg from the hen to the table, the great chance there is of the egg becoming contaminated with bacteria.

[JasonZ]

Aside form the advertising aspect, the more steps and the more complicated they make getting the egg from the hen to the table, the great chance there is of the egg becoming contaminated with bacteria.

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In the IHT article, there was a technology sidebar and the process is pretty amazing. The laser etch is applied in about 34-73 milliseconds and penetrates about 5% of the thickness of egg shell (50-90 micrometers). So, the time delay is almost non-existent and I don't think anyone has researched the effect of compromizing 5% shell thickness on infection rate ....

Edited August 12, 2006 by JasonZ (log)

[Blue_Egg_Farmer]

Before an egg leave the hen it is coated with a clear protective sealant called the bloom. The bloom seals the pores of the eggshell enough that in most instances bacteria can not get into the egg....it is the eggs first and most important line of defence, and part of the reason an unwashed egg can sit out in a nest box for 3 weeks fertile or unfertile and not go bad.

Large producers, anyone with more than 500 laying hens, must by law wash their eggs.

In the process the bloom is scrubbed off, opening the egg up to infection. next is the wash, it is usually at this point that samenella is spread from one egg to the next, while the egg is being bathed in the warm - (by law the temperature of the water must be 20 degrees higher than the egg), clorinated , recycled no more than 3 times, dirty wash water- the water splashs around to other eggs nearby and the bacteria it contains will find a nice new home.

( Think of a hot tub in a public gym - lots of healthy people, skin pores opening in the nice warm water then maybe someone real sick gets in - you just pray that there was enough clorine in that water before you had a chance to scamper out)

After the wash the eggs are resealed with a tasty coating of mineral oil and perhaps a powdering ( they used to use talcum powder, now I believe if they powder the eggs it is with cornstarch, some do , some don't).

So now it is all clean again right?

Maybe, maybe not.

It depends who that egg was bathing with.

Now laser etching is now involved

the spots the laser lands will for a millisecond open the pores of the egg again, "pushing in" what ever was on the surface of the egg. It might only be in microscopic amounts but if it happens to land on an egg that was washed with samanella in the water, and it was on it's 3rd rinse ( the clorine has by then started to loose its disinfecting strength) it could potentially be giving that egg samanella.