It’s funny, because right before I read this, I bought some shoes at Target. $8. Check it out: http://tinyurl.com/ho7ou.

One of the user comments on the shoes says she saw some “just like them” on a celebrity.

In the real world, folks have been calling it Targèt for decades. Making fun of themselves for shopping there (to benefit from cheap prices). It was a humorous way to pretend Target was really a high end Targèt.

So, this campaign takes a previously existing pop culture joke about the crappiness of Target, then puts a large price tag on it.

But who’s going to buy this stuff? “Rebellious” teenagers of the nouveau riche? ‘Look, I’m rich enough to make fun of you poor people and yet it’s kinda clever because MTV told me it was.’

Will it work? Sure, there’s enough bubbleheads with cash to ring up a tidy profit. I give mad props to BrandCentral’s dashing creativity in new ways to pilfer value out of dried up culture. And a hat tip to Target for its willingness to make fun of itself as high culture when it *is* low culture all in the name of making a couple bucks… which may, in some ways, actually raise the brand up from the dredges a little on the scale of cultural value (ironically, probably the full purpose to make fun of the rich making fun of the poor like the webs we weave). Interesting business; the rubber band of brand.

Reminds me of the monologue delivered when Joe Pesci’s character cracks in JFK. Who’s fucking who? Nobody knows.

I wouldn’t be caught dead in that crap.