Justin had worked for the Rip Off Magic Company for many years. Joining as a warehouse box packer in his late teens, he had now been at the company for over 20 years and had worked his way up to his current position of Marketing Manager.
His job was, on the face of it, a straightforward one. Every new product that came in simply had to be presented to the customers in the best possible light with its strengths accentuated and any weaknesses ignored or swept under the marketing carpet. And with both text and video at his disposal, Justin had turned his publicity virtually into an artform.
Today he was working on the advertising for the latest creation of Cliff Hanger, many of whose previous ideas Justin had turned from unusable dross to pipedream heaven. Laying the props out on the table in front of him (a length of invisible thread, a thumbtip and a single playing card with a minute hole in the top), Justin could immediately see that his creativity was once more going to be called upon to turn these raw materials into a highly desirable magic purchase.
First things first, the packaging. You could just slip the props into a seal again bag, but that didn’t make them look important enough to charge a high price for. Much better, would be to use one of the slim cardboard boxes to which a sticker bearing a graphic and the trick name could easily be attached. Having a box automatically added £10.00 to the perceived value of the trick.
Next, the instructions. Well, Justin knew that the method could be described in half a page of printed text, but that was old school and nowadays everyone expected online video directions. Thank God the days of having to produce a DVD and fit that in the package were over and done with—so much easier just to stick a minute piece of card inside with a url on it.
Wayne Smoothie was the video instruction guru who could talk up any inconsequential piece of magic tat and make it sound like a Broadway show masterpiece, so Justin pinged off an email to arrange for Wayne to come in and do the recording.
The box needed a brief description of the effect, but since the trick sounded pathetic (a card balances on a spectator’s palm), Justin decided to use the old dodge of not actually saying what the effect was at all. Instead, he had a large stock of ‘unsolicited quotes’ that the Rip Off Magic Company had paid top magicians to pretend they had said, and so Justin could use some of those to add much needed credibility.
To these he would add some key phrases such as “the wait is over, after 30 years Cliff Hanger releases one of his most closely guarded secrets” and “learn a gem from the working repertoire of one of magic’s greats”. That should fool most of the ill informed youngsters into buying it.
In terms of general publicity, Justin would use other solid convincers such as “can be worked surrounded” (even though no one working in those conditions would ever even consider using the trick in the first place) and “no re-set, ideal for workers” (there was nothing to re-set, but you would need to replenish some of the props after each performance), so that would encourage those who never did shows to buy it. Great. That was about it. Definitely worth £55 of anyone’s money.