YouWish

Hi All

Oliver Burkeman’s piece in the Guardian magazine on April 11th, focuses on the surprising findings of Ran Kivetz & Anat Keinan.  They demonstrated that regret over an indulgence not partaken outlives the guilt over giving in to the temptation.

Whilst not subscribing to a social life of  full on hedonism myself (my wife won’t let me) and I wouldn’t encourage anyone to order the Ferrari to replace the Mondeo just yet, I draw re-assurance from these findings and exhort them to you all.

This is not too foolhardy in the self propagating credit “crunch” we are in. The beauty of the British, as Bill Bryson  suggested, is that we take our pleasures small – delight at hot buttered tea cakes vs a 6ft pile of pancakes and maple syrup or a condo by the sea for our transatlantic cousins.

Hence we can all go crazy without too much damage (I once had a woman in a research group  I was moderating tell me that her idea of bliss was to buy a family sized bar of Galaxy and hide in the airing cupboard!).

Burkeman’s article  cites other research from Kivetz that affirms respondents would take a $80 spa day voucher instead of $85 cash because they know the decision of spending it so indulgently is taken out of their hands. Armed with this thought, sitting here dreaming up promotions  in You Wish towers , we played the “what would you do with a gifted  £500″ game.  In 1988, sitting in my ad agency  it might have meant a  new pair of red specs  the size of dustbin lids*  and a hangover to match but today  it would be  something I can experience pleasure through collective experience. We are therefore going to offer soon a stay in the Landmark Trust’s Pineapple – watch this space.  

Finally and not least I am going to leave you with a quote. It’s  by Emily Dickinson,  just to prove that whilst this is  (so) not the  Harvard Business Review,  I don’t get (all) my quotes about life from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. 

“That it will never come again
Is what makes life so sweet”

So on this fine day, take the wrapper off and get into whatever indulgence your airing cupboard contains.

You Wish (sic)

Until tomorrow.

Nick

* I clearly resisted saying the specs would fit the eyes of Dr T.J. Eckleburg as that would be a literary allusion too far and fool no-one.