Whoever thought of this idea is an advertising genius: Persuade scores of people to give up three hours of their evening to watch commercials, tell them they can't leave early, have them fill out dozens of pages of consumer questionnaires and then dismiss them with only a "thank you very much."
Yet that's exactly what about 250 Wasatch Front residents did, all respondents to a "you have been selected" notice in the mail that included four tickets to attend screenings of two new television programs, complete with commercials.
Except the event was more about the commercials and the questions that went with them.
"It was a gimmick," said Debbie Summerhays, a Riverton resident, "to get people's opinions on a variety of products."
A gimmick, maybe, but one that played to a capacity crowd recently at the Wyndham Hotel. And judging by what the master of ceremonies was saying, it plays to packed houses quite regularly in Salt Lake City.
The event was sponsored by Television Preview, a Hollywood company "formed over 25 years ago for the purpose of providing independent, impartial testing of broadcast material," according to the company literature. "You have been selected to help represent the television viewing preferences of the entire country."
That could explain the wasteland on network television these days.
Actually, I wasn't special enough to be selected, but my wife, Donna, also a journalist at the Deseret Morning News, was. So we decided to attend in the spirit of journalistic curiosity.
For the record, the drama "Soulmates" is pathetic. When the therapist hypnotizes a patient with "your eyes are getting heavy," most of the audience was nodding off in boredom. And Valerie Harper's "City" sitcom, despite collecting dust at the studio for the past 12 years, was immensely more funny than just about anything on the air today except maybe the "Simpsons" and "Arrested Development."
But the programming was merely an afterthought to a barrage of questions about my buying habits. And there were a fair number of personal questions that made no sense whatsoever.
Is it anybody's business how often I clean the bathroom? Or if I clean it before guests arrive? Or if I have personally purchased a toilet bowl brush in the past year?
I don't really care if they know whether I own a dog and a cat. And what edition of Windows I use or if I subscribe to satellite or cable would seem fair game to marketers. But do they really need to know about my pain and how often I take prescription pain medication? Or whether I have dandruff and an itchy scalp?
Every good gimmick has a hook, and the hook in this case was $250 in door prizes. But to qualify, you had to peruse page upon page of competing products, from shampoos to ear plugs, from athletes foot cures to nail files. Just circle the product you want and you could win.
Actually, my daughter Jessica, a certifiable aficionado of TV fare, won one of the drawings. They said they would mail her a check she could use to buy the products she had circled. She doesn't really need the products, but she is happy to give her two-cents worth on new television programs.
"I've always said they (the television industry) should ask me what I think," she said. "But this was a lot more about marketing than getting my opinion on television shows."
Was Television Preview's night of ads really worth it? Well, it's not for everybody. It was fun for many, boring for others.
"There are some nights you wish you were anywhere else," the host told the crowd.
"It was interesting," Summerhays observed. "I didn't exactly have fun. But I might do it again. I want to see if there are fun shows out there."
And a consumer who keeps coming back for more is an advertiser's dream come true.
E-MAIL: spang@desnews.com