For those of you that aren’t familiar with the New York City metropolitan area, there’s a small but well-known chain of deep discount department stores called Century 21 (warning–Flash site with obnoxious music). You can oftentimes find great deals there, and that’s the major appeal; they carry so much stock that turns over so quickly that every time you go in there’s something new.

I stopped by the store earlier today to pick up a new shower curtain liner and noticed a new slogan printed on the receipt:

While on its face this seems like a cutesy slogan that doesn’t mean anything, it’s actually problematic, as it highlights one of the nastier qualities of the store.

Because so much of the merchandise is so deeply discounted and because there are limited quantities of everything on hand, from time to time small scuffles do break out, especially around the holidays. That’s not to say that you should ever go into a Century 21 store expecting to see a brawl. Usually it’s just like any other shopping experience (with two or three times the normal volume of customers in close proximity), but there have been occasions that I have seen shouting matches erupt over some relatively trivial item. Fortunately these are usually resolved quickly thanks to the stores’ sizable security staff.

The bigger question is this: Is it wise for Century 21 to promote, even almost celebrate, this decidedly negative and unpleasant aspect of shopping in their stores? Certainly I can appreciate the whimsical angle of the slogan, especially if I approach it by pretending to be someone who is totally unfamiliar with the chain. However, as a customer of the stores (I actually live less than a block away from their Brooklyn location and I’m there quite frequently), I tend to disagree with the premise; I’m not sure I want to get into fisticuffs over something as frivolous as a Calvin Klein shirt.

Is this a wise marketing tactic³³? Or did someone make a mistake here? I tend to lean towards the latter.3

1. I have to say that I can imagine an amusing television commercial or two to go along with the slogan, possibly involving lady shoppers amusingly beating each other with their overladen shopping bags, but I worry that such a campaign might just encourage bad behavior.333

3