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What's next? A chance to win Dad a night with a hooker? Maybe that's how your father really wants to commemorate being your parent.
This week, The Fan 590, Canada's leading sports radio station, offered a "Give Dad a Divorce" contest as a Father's Day promotion. "It's the perfect gift for the man who has everything, and doesn't want it," reads the cheeky copy posted on the station's website.
So, come on, what are you waiting for? Give Dad the nudge to leave his marriage - to your nagging mother, presumably - and he'll thank you for being the thoughtful son or daughter he always wanted. Next year, perhaps you could try to win him some hair plugs as he sets out on the midlife dating scene. What fun!
In the age of shameless indiscretion in which we live - what? you didn't notice? - the subject of divorce has become a marketing opportunity that is expanding like middle-aged girth. When you think of all the advertising budgets aimed at people entering the wedding market, it only makes sense, given the high divorce rate, that some companies are there to catch them if and when they come out the other side.
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The divorced often have to sell houses. And buy new ones. They may be ready for an expensive mid-life crisis: Think Porsches, a new wardrobe and holidays they can't really afford! Many want to lose weight. They may want a new hairstyle. Or a new face.
Last summer, Pond's, the anti-aging skin-care line, teamed up with USA Network to sponsor a six-part miniseries starring Debra Messing called The Starter Wife, about the post-divorce life of a fortysomething woman whose Hollywood hubby has unexpect- edly dumped her for a younger model. The USA Network website offers a tank top and contests as well as advice from personal trainers and dating experts. The show is due to launch as a regular series in the fall.
Offering Dad a divorce for Father's Day is just one more step along the continuum of entrepreneurial thinking, presumably.
"I don't think we are trivializing [divorce]," says Ruth Winker, promotions manager of The Fan 590. "We're accepting of it. It's a reality."
The radio station targets males, aged 25 to 55. The contest, which Ms. Winker says is not a hoax, is open to members of its online fan club, who must be 19 or over.
"It would be grown children who are doing this for their father," she explains. "It's not meant for young children." The station has already retained the services of a family lawyer, whose fees it will partly cover (for an undisclosed amount).
"We are not typical in terms of offering Dad a tie for Father's Day," she says, adding that other "off the wall" contests included a bachelor party in Amsterdam. There has been no negative feedback to the "Give Dad a Divorce" contest, she says.
Divorce as a marketing opportunity encompasses all sort of voices, some more conservative than others. Hallmark Cards Inc., the iconic marketer of acceptable sentiments, now has cards for people who are divorcing. Discreetly, there is no mention of the word divorce. It's reframed as a syrupy life passage.
"The first step out the door is hardest. Each step after comes easier and faster, until one day you stop and realize you're free," reads the front of one card. On the inside, it says, "How incredible to discover your greatest champion is you."
Then there's Smashingkatie.com which advertises itself as "a perfectly cheeky break-up boutique." Among other items, you can buy a "Bitch? Moi?" flask, a "Call Her a Slut" mug and the book How to Tell if Your Boyfriend is the Antichrist.
There's even an item that women are meant to snicker over at the expense of their ex-husbands. It's called "A teeny weeny disk drive" and it's shaped like a really small ... oh, never mind.
