Cuppa Joe
To Go.
Oh those Canadjhans, they can really piss you off sometimes eh? Just when you begin to think they might almost be Americans they have to go and assert their sovereignty. I was at a Canadian wedding this last weekend (I understood every word thank you very much.). The happy couple would be honeymooning in Cuba. Cuba for God’s sake, they’ve got live communists walking around the streets in broad daylight down there.
But I digress. The point I’m trying to make is that even though Canadians are politically and economically backward they still occasionally trump us in the practicality department.
The case in point is the Canadian solution to Stella Liebeck Syndrome.
Stella what?
Stella Liebeck Syndrome; we’ll just call it SLS for short.
You remember Stella Liebeck. Way back in 1994 she was Ronald McDonald’s worst nightmare.
In response to SLS the Americans hired think tanks, focus groups, lawyers communications consultants and public relations experts. You already know what this horde
of geniuses came up with.
There are posters on the walls of every McDonalds that say, "Our coffee is HOT."
The Styrofoam cups say, in several languages, "Inside this container is coffee and it’s HOT."
Even the lids proclaim that under this cover is a cup of coffee, which is HOT.
In other words, this multi-million dollar effort produced a MESSAGE. "McDonald’s coffee is precisely what it is supposed to be, HOT."
The Canadian solution was elegantly simple, profoundly economical and I suspect far more effective. In essence they did nothing.
How is that a solution you ask?
Let me tell you a bit more about my recent trip north. Three and a half hours in, I was getting a little drowsy. As luck would have it I spied the golden arches. I stopped for a brief stroll and a cup of HOT coffee.
In contrast to the American Styrofoam containers Canadian McDonalds puts its coffee in waxed cardboard cups, thin, waxed, cardboard cups.
As I reached for my coffee I could feel the warmth, no make that HEAT, before I even touched the cup and I thought, "I had better get a careful grip on this because it’s HOT."
My next thought was, "I had better get this out to my car and into my cup holder quickly because it’s HOT."
"I had better be sure this is seated firmly in the cup holder because I don’t want it to tip over because it’s HOT."
"I had better open the lid carefully because I don’t want to splash this coffee on me because it’s HOT."
"I had better accelerate smoothly to avoid spilling the coffee because it’s HOT."
"I had better watch for bumps and potholes because the coffee’s HOT."
"I think I’ll just sip this coffee at stop signs and traffic lights because it’s HOT."
Oddly enough there’s one thought I never entertained. I never said to myself, "Gee, I think I’ll stick this HOT cup of coffee in my crotch and see how far down the road I’ll get before I do 2.7 million dollars worth of damage to my private parts."
Self-preservation eh?
Survival of the fittest eh?
Sensible eh?
The elixir of life.
HOT coffee.
As it ought to be.
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