sa1177

I dunno Hap..I somewhat disagree. IMO I think at least part of the reason for the switch is to dissassociate the store from the militarry and by exstension the war. Of course those of us familiar with it know that in the present day the store has nothing to do with the military but those unfamiliar with the GI Joe's Brand don't know that. As we all know public oppinion for the war and military in general is not very good. IMO a good marketing firm would do its very best to dissassociate it's clients product from something like that.

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GI JOES... the real american hero!



YO JOE!

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Dan

I think it's more to make it clear that it's no longer gov't surplus, and re-branding the store name.

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A Buddhist walks up to a hot dog vendor and says "Make me one with everything".

when will the loss of life end?

The world respects the power of our example, not an example of our power.

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Schilly

They took the GI of the one near my home.

I had heard that partly it has to do with their marketing had dropped the GI part already, and that most people simply refer to it as "Joe's"

Verro

Obviously political correctness plays a role in marketing, even more so in recent years. The flood gate seemed to be opened when images of Santa Claus were removed from Coke's holiday marketing, since then anything that could be viewed as politicaly questionable is getting the axe. I would suspect this was the case with GI Joes.

Hopefully this trend doesn't carry over too much into our daily lives as it has in the UK:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...n_page_id=1770

Dan

think folks, when was the last time anyone of us thuoght "Hm..GI Joes, I bet thats a military thing"?

Hell, I seriously doubt most of us knew that it started out as a military surplus type store. And you got the fact that a big part of their business is hunting and fishing (which would suggest not political correctness) and clothing, that they just want to change the name a bit. It's not like they thought people avoided GI Joes because people are against the war. Thinking that is an insult to people who are against the war (and an easy "see? They hate the troops" battle cry).

It's like when Fred Meyer bought out Ralphs and Frys..they changed the names to Fred Meyer (but it didn't go over that well).

Name change, much like uniform name, is a quick and easy way to make money/create interest. I really doubt that they thought "hm, I know that the NW isn't too fond about the war (but than again, who is?) so lets change the name of a store that most people don't realize has anything to do with being an army surplus store to begin with but hasn't been one for like 35 years or so...because they might be offended by it!"

sure...it can't be that they just wanted to drop the GI part to make the name seem cleaner. It has to be those evil corporate liberals who are trying to politically correctize everything!!

__________________
A Buddhist walks up to a hot dog vendor and says "Make me one with everything".

when will the loss of life end?

The world respects the power of our example, not an example of our power.

I'd like to say I made this, but I didn't

barfo

I'm skeptical. Are you going to buy more stuff there because they changed the name? I'm pretty sure the name won't cause me to spend $1 more or $1 less than I would have otherwise.

barfo

Dan

Im not, but it's because I already know what GI Joe's stuff is pretty crappy. But for the people who don't know the name change, might think it's a new store. It's why stores remodel, so people will come in and maybe like what they see.

What, you think people are going to go "oh good, they finally dropped that evil GI from the name, I'm no longer boycotting the store!!!"??

like I said, I doubt most people between the ages of 18-38, either knew it was at one time a surplus store, or gave a right royal bucket of crap...and I doubt the people who DID shop there, are too worried about "political correctness". It doesn't make a lot of sense to think it was a PC move.

__________________
A Buddhist walks up to a hot dog vendor and says "Make me one with everything".

when will the loss of life end?

The world respects the power of our example, not an example of our power.

I'd like to say I made this, but I didn't