So after posting about the Orbit Baby System's appearance on The Office last week--and the ensuing discussion of the suckage of product placement, I got an email from Joseph Hei, the co-founder of Orbit. As you can see from even his first sentence, he's obviously a man of great wisdom and discernment and one of the true business geniuses of our--or any other--time:
We were thrilled to get written up on daddytypes about the Office episode. Given the comments about 'product placement' though, I wanted to give you the straight, scout's-honor, scoop: we didn't place the product in any way - the Office production staff contacted us, we sent a sample to LA, and they ended up rewriting a lot of the script around the product. Even though Bryan did get to go to watch some filming, you never know what'd going to end up cut out. We were as amazed as anyone else at how much Orbit was featured, at how much they dug the product, and frankly didn't have any say on how much it should or should not show up. Funny that your reader thought it should show up less.So there you have it, and from a boy scout, no less.
For my part, I just assumed the appearance was a by-product of the celebrity/publicist/baby gear machine, but definitely not paid placement. Especially when I saw product shots like the one above. That said, I like to think that the Office charged photographer Anne Geddes an arm and a leg for this cameo; take her for everything she's got, I say.
Previously: Orbit on The Office: '$1200? That's What I Spent On My Whole Bomb Shelter'
Is your most prominent ad on purpose or on accident? I'm in support of Prop 8 and you should be too.
With the exception of one skanky looking gambling site one time, ads are not accepted or rejected based on their content.
But since you mention it, I am not in favor of Prop 8, and I'm troubled by my church's expansive involvement in this political issue.
I am reluctant to turn this into a political comment string...but, what the heck, let's do it. We haven't had a good comment throw-down since the Formula vs. Breastfeeding Wars of '07 (I'm sort-of making that up).
Go Greg!
That's a funny story; it shows how one can jump to conclusions that, no matter how well reasoned and thoroughly justified, are utterly wrong.
Kudos to Orbit on the free publicity, and I'm happy to be wrong about the product placement...