It seems that these days it's not enough to be a celebrity. You have to be more than that. You have to be a
brand. You must have your name on clothes, jewellery, perfume, make up, music, books, films... anything you can really. You needn't be any good at any of the things you're doing, but that's not important - the key thing is maximum exposure, wherever and however you can manage it. Hell, it's worked for Victoria Beckham, hasn't it?
Taking a step back, I can only assume that the logic behind such aggressive branding is that a certain percentage of people are expected to latch on to a given celebrity and can then be persuaded to buy anything with their name on it. Like Lily Allen's music? Why not buy one of her dresses. Like Sarah Jessica Parker in Sex And The City? Try her perfume. Like Paris Hilton... in her half-arsed sex tape? Dress yourself head to foot in her clobber, wear her perfume and jewellery, listen to her album, read her book and watch her in a film (with her clothes on this time around). Perhaps this last one is the biggest mystery of all, given that she's famous for taking her kit off and is then marketed entirely towards women, but maybe I shouldn't be surprised - Playboy don't seem to have any difficulty persuading women to buy anything with their bunny on it... But I digress.
In the UK, we're blessed with a particularly mindless power-branded couple in the form of Katie Price/Jordan and Peter Andre. Famous for having a surplus of breasts and a deficit of musical talent, they dominate women's trashy magazines and get their name tacked on to just about anything going. While Peter has mainly just tagged along and sired a few children, Katie has dabbled to a greater or lesser degree in the following:
- Glamour modelling
- Politics (no, really)
- Television
- Music
- Lingerie
- Jewellery
- Haircare products
- Horsecare products
- Books (autobiographical)
- Books (childrens)
The only field to permeate our house is the children's books. Beth's last childminder gave us one of Katie and Peter's "Mermaids and pirates" books after her daughter got too old for it. The story is about Katie the mermaid and Peter the pirate having a picnic, together with an assortment of seagulls and crabs. There's a nice little moral about sharing. The illustrations are nice enough. As a kids book, it's pretty good really.
On the back of the book there is the usual copyright notice and publishing details, and the following text, which I quote here verbatim:
For fun, games and lots more visit www.katiesmermaidsandpirates.co.uk For Katie Price's adult website visit www.katieprice.co.uk
A brand too far? I think so.
