When I was a kid, I lathered up with a bar of Ivory Soap whenever I took a bath. It was the logical choice for Mom to buy Ivory for several reasons, not least of which was: “It floats!” That was the sales pitch for the Ivory Soap company, and it was hard to resist that exclamation point.
Of course, it didn’t hurt that Ivory soap was also cheap, and Mom could save even more money by not investing in a rubber ducky to keep me company. What would be the point, when imagination could change that white floating bar of soap from a ducky, to a shark, to a battleship, all in the blink of an eye?
But Ivory Soap wasn’t just for kids. Later in life, I often took week-long canoe trips into the Boundary Waters wilderness of Canada’s Quetico Provincial Park, and a bar of Ivory Soap was a good choice to bring along, because: “It floats!” A bar of Irish Spring might plummet to the bottom of a lake on the first day of the trip, leaving you reeking like a moose for the rest of the week.
So “It floats!” was a winning sales pitch for a canoe trip into the wilderness. And to make that choice even better, Ivory isn’t harmful to the environment, because it’s biodegradable — which was Ivory Soap’s other exclamatory sales pitch: “99 and 44/100 percent pure!”
But despite Ivory’s buoyancy and gentle respect for the ecology of Canadian lakes, the math of that sales pitch burrowed a worry-hole in my head.
I am sure the Ivory folks thought it was a strong selling point to announce that their soap is that close to perfect. The unspoken implication is that competitor soaps were probably lagging somewhere well behind in the purity department.
But still, I couldn’t help but wonder about that remaining 56/100th of a percent shortfall from perfect purity. I questioned why those impurities were left to muck about in that bar of soap instead of being removed altogether. Why not work a little harder to get it completely pure, instead of just 99 and 44/100 percent pure?
And for that matter, what exactly were those impurities? Battery acid? Kitty litter? Shards of glass? They weren’t listed in the ingredients — probably a wise omission from a marketing standpoint.
The Ivory Soap company probably paid some advertising firm big bucks to come up with a slogan that would sell soap to moms and canoeists all over the world, and “99 and 44/100 percent pure!” seemed good enough for them. After all, who could argue with that near-perfect score? A number like that on your SAT will send you to any college or university in the world.
And I guess the sales pitch worked well enough, because the company has been selling soap to moms and canoeists since the 1840’s. Although they currently own less than one percent of the soap market, Ivory is still there today, floating along after almost 200 years in near-perfect purity.
But still, it’s a strange sales pitch to even remind consumers that your product falls anywhere short of perfection, isn’t it?
After all, imagine hearing your spouse say on your wedding day: “I vow to be faithful to you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 363 days of the year!” Because that would add up to 99 and 44/100 percent of a year’s faithfulness.
Wouldn’t you wonder what was going on during that one not-quite-pure weekend, year after year? Wouldn’t you demand to see the pictures?
Or standing at the meat counter, would your mouth water as you reached for that pound of ground chuck under the sign: “99 and 44/100 percent free of rodent hair and insect parts!”
Sometimes, being close to perfect just isn’t good enough, is it?
Then again, you have to give props to the Ivory Soap folks for their transparency. OK, so they’re not perfect — who is? — and they’re laying it all on the line by admitting to us that they’re just 56/100th of a percent short of ideal, and hoping we’ll honor their honesty and forgive them their shortfall. After all, Ivory Soap’s shortcomings are still almost 20 percent better than that toothpaste you waggle around in your mouth that is recommended by only four out of five dentists.
And besides, wouldn’t you love that level of transparency from our politicians? Don’t we deserve office-holders who are “99 and 44/100 percent corruption-and-obstruction free!” and who lie to us only 56/100th of a percent of the time?
They’d get my vote—even if they’re still too dense to float.
TR Kerth is the author of the book “Revenge of the Sardines.” Contact him at trkerth@yahoo.com
