Marketing. In most cases it is important to selling a product. Marketing can determine a product’s success or predict its downfall. After flipping through the most recent edition of The Downtowner, the following advertisment was found on the back cover. The ad is for the condo building under construction just east of Glenwood South, West at North. New Raleigh did not add the phrases “killer views”, “white picket fences”, and “bed, bath, and whatever” for impact. This is the exact paragraph and full marketing ad that appears on the back cover.
Disclaimer: Read this with a circa-1985 Los Angeles Valley accent at your own risk.
There is no 3-bedroom ranch and patch of grass on a cul-de-sac for me. I don’t do white picket fences, mini-vans or Bed, Bath and Whatever. I have no illusions of suburban grandeur and no way I’m going to live like my parents.
Instead, I have a life. My life. And I want to live where I live - restaurants, clubs, friends, nightlife - hanging out in Glenwood South. And my condo at West puts me right in the heart of everything I want to do, right in the middle of the action.
Don’t get me wrong; I still enjoy the finer things, like the killer views from high above the downtown scene and a rooftop pool that is like my own private VIP room. It’s just that with a whole city at my front door, my life is on my terms. So, pardon me for living.
On the positive side, the ad is promoting urban living and attempts to downplay suburbia as a passé form of living. But, is this the type of marketing needed to get people to live in Downtown Raleigh? It is not very well written and sounds like the first person of someone who watched too much Saved by the Bell as a child. It also reads like it is coaxing clients into a certain lifestyle that only revolves only around Glenwood South and not downtown as a whole. This is simply another version of suburbia. It’s called sectionalism or separatism. Glenwood South has become the castle and soon there will be a massive moat surrounding the area. Be prepared for a drawbridge beside Snoopy’s.
So, pardon me for reading, but downtown living is more than spending your life on one particular street and looking at the tall buildings 8 blocks away from your high end condo. Downtown Raleigh consists of a mixed bag that involves City Market, the Warehouse District, the Government Complex, Historic Oakwood, and many other eclectic areas. The overlap is necessary. The “middle of the action” may be Glenwood South for some (or many), but it is not for all.
Condo buildings built in downtown must look to add to downtown as a whole and not to only certain sectors. So again, pardon me for reading but the marketing for these buildings should be inclusive, not exclusive. If not, “Bed, Bath and Whatever” will show up next door and those “killer views” will be obstructed by cultural boundaries that will be reminiscent of the “white picket fences” that have littered Pleasantville and your average suburb since the 1950s.
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