Track #1 - "Pottery Barn Gazing: Who Are Those Apparitions in the Fall Catalogue?"

Have you sat down and opened a catalog looking at items that you probably would never own? Seeing yourself on the pages enjoying the beautiful furnishings around you, just imagining enjoying that recliner? Hank Stuever brings forth a tale of a company that usually never uses human models in their ads. The place is the Pottery Barn.

The Pottery Barn feels that their potential clients can see themselves better in those surroundings if there is not a model there to mess it up. We, as clients might not the look of the picture with someone in it and therefore would just bypass the page. Additionally, models are harder to work with. The lighting has to make them and the furnishings look good, which just ads complications to each photo shoot.

Hank Stuever gives us ideas that maybe the company wants us to think that the people that live in these aesthetically perfect homes are out, being busy families in the community, or at the park or beach. It gives us the thoughts of a perfect family in a perfect house.

Myself, I enjoy opening a magazine and whether or not there are human models in the ads or not, whatever catches my eye, catches my eye. As a matter of fact, I usually find the "empty" space around furniture to be cold and not really attractive. So, for this consumer, the non-populated catalog does not interest me very much at all.