1769 Captain Cook wanted sailors to eat sauerkraut to ward off scurvy, but they disliked the foreign ‘kraut’ and wanted to stick to their own food. So Cook made sure it was only served at the officers’ table, and after a week all the sailors wanted some: authority bias in action.
All Threads
After watching a video of a car crash, people estimate the cars to be going much faster (40 mph) when they’re asked about the cars ‘smashing’ into each other, versus ‘hitting’ each other (34 mph). One simple word has a big impact on our memory.
The danger of car collisions isn’t linear. You’re very unlikely to die when going at less than 20 miles per hour. But at 30 miles per hour, about one in five pedestrians will not survive. And at 40 miles per hour, this goes up to half.
In 2005, BP ran a PR campaign which popularised the idea of carbon footprint – a way of portraying climate change as a result of individual actions, rather than the activities of fossil fuel companies.
Need proof that brands create status? In a study on dating website HotOrNot.com, three pictures showed the same man with the same background – the only thing that changed was the car he was next to. The more expensive the car, the higher his rating.
Athens began using alternate number plate restrictions in the 1990s – on a given day you could only drive if you had an odd or even number. The rule only encouraged people to buy an extra car so they were always free to drive.
The online mattress brand is now no stranger to physical retail; it has over 50 stores worldwide, hosted a glamping trip during the last total solar eclipse, and even set up a pay as you go nap hotel in New York called the Dreamery.
In the film Cast Away, Tom Hanks’ only desert island companion is a Wilson volleyball. A heartwarming friendship, and perhaps the most effective product placement of all time; Wilson paid nothing for the feature, which is unheard of in Hollywood today, and insiders say that it is still one of the top three things people know about the brand two decades later. In fact Wilson still sells 20-25,000 ‘Cast Away’ balls per year.
Neutering dogs is considered normal, but it’s seen as barbaric when done to humans.
Fans of Step Brothers will be pleased to know that the film’s iconic event is now a reality. Every year since 2015, the Catalina Island Company (just off California) has paid homage to the film with a two-day celebration full of music, wine, and quotes from the characters.
In ancient Egypt, cats were objects of worship – considered to be a manifestation of the goddess Bastet. Fast forward to Europe in the Middle Ages, and cats had become linked with witchcraft by the Catholic Church. Thus ensued a 300 year campaign of systematic feline torture and genocide, the goal of which was to exterminate cats entirely.
Cazoo’s £6 billion valuation hinted that all car buying would be done online. But the company has now gone into administration, after generating losses of £700 million in 2022.
In Japan 78% of music sales are still physical CDs. But it’s not because consumers love the audio quality – it’s because CDs allow fans to engage with artists, who will bundle them with perks such as concert ticket vouchers, invitations to meet-and-greet events, and voting cards.
Want to be a CEO? It helps to be tall. In the U.S, 14.5% of men are 6ft or taller. But among CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, that figure rises to 58%.
One of the main determinants of whether people donate to charity is not whether they can afford to but whether they are asked to. The percentage of people being frequently asked to donate plummeted during Covid-19. Sure enough, the percentage who donated fell – and only really recovered at the end of 2023, when charities started asking again.