The Despair Inc. Blog

Wow. This promotion is so good I don’t even have to dress it up with cheeky ironic marketing copy. Here’s the scoop. If you were hoping to pick up a few pieces of DespairWear for your holiday gift-giving (and you really should- they are so dadgum comfortable and well-printed, to say nothing of their brilliance…) we’re are briefly offering YOU the chance to do it ON THE CHEAP! No, we didn’t lower prices on the website. We’re just offering this deal to you guys and gals because, despite our protestations to the contrary, we actually love you folks. (Just Filio love for now, not the Eros or Agape kind*.)

If you want to pick up some great shirts on the cheap- you’ll need to use this coupon code when completing your order: notallofusdressforsuccess.

It will automatically reduce the price of any and all t-shirts in your shopping cart by 30%. Want to buy 4 different shirts? Go ahead- you’ll save $23! Even I know it’s a great deal. When I heard about it this morning, I was all like, “For real, whaaaaa?” and my boss was like, “Yeah, totally” so then I go, “That’s like, whoa!” and she was all, “Yah tell me about it” so then I’m all, “Okay, I will… It’s like crazy Eddie time, but you know, without the fraud, racketeering, and money laundering…” and I had a lot more to say but then she cut me off and goes, “I didn’t really mean for you to elaborate further. It’s a good deal. Let’s leave it at that.” Girl harshed my vibe something fierce with that barbed volley, let me tell you.

Remember, though, we print our shirts on American Apparel tees because they take the ink really well and they’re super-dooper comfortable. But they run SMALL! So order a size larger than you normally would- just to be safe.

As far as I can tell, this coupon code expires early next week. So act fast if you’re looking to score some clever, comfy, cool shirts for your holiday stocking stuffers!

(Remember, the code is notallofusdressforsuccess.)

Gotta run! I’m about to get my Scotch and Retro-gaming fix on.

* I mean, I really don’t know you THAT well. Plus, I’m just sort of playing the field right now, you know, not looking for things to get TOO serious… Not after what happened LAST time with a certain someone who I’ve promised not to mention by name- though she knows who she is, and for some blasted reason chooses to subscribe to my Wailing List even though I’ve asked her to stop reading it **, since SHE was the one who decided it was over between us, and she’s the one who accuses me of not being able to let go.

** Well, who can’t let who go, really? I’m not reading your Facebook or Twitter postings anymore- but you can’t stop reading my Wailing List emails? They aren’t even to you or about you or of concern to you… But you still gripe to certain mutual friends about some random marketing newsletter I sent weeks before? It’s not my fault things with Mr. Glamtastic went south. You should’ve known it was doomed from the moment you saw him cough violently after knocking back that shot of melon liqueur at The Light Bar. You can’t build a House of Love on a foundation made of Wuss. And if you want my permission to have that quote put on a tombstone memorializing the death of your rebound relationship with Mr. Orange Blossom Scents with Lavender Basenotes, well, you better well pay me a royalty***…

*** “Call me!”

Some believed his book was forever lost to history.

Others assumed it was only a legend in the first place- just another in a seemingly endless series of elaborate hoaxes perpetrated by a master of the craft.

Could it possibly be true? Did the world’s most notorious con-artist, Charles Ponzi himself, actually write an autobiography- his own personal account of his ascendency from obscurity and poverty into staggering wealth, fame, and eventual infamy?

And if he DID author such a work- what on earth became of it? Despair, Inc. has discovered the answer.

And this holiday season, we are making a fully-illustrated and carefully-documented version of the legendary lost work available to the world at large for the very first time.

Yes. We’re completely serious. No, this isn’t a fiction, or an elaborate satire. This is the real book- published by the real man who changed even our language.

—

Featuring:

• OVER 100 PHOTOGRAPHS, MANY NEVER BEFORE PUBLISHED

• THE FULL, UNABRIDGED TEXT OF PONZI’S 1936 LOST MASTERPIECE

• OVER 100 ADDITIONAL PAGES OF ORIGINAL HISTORICAL COMMENTARY BY DESPAIR, INC.

• A MASSIVE 7.265” x 11.5” PAPERBACK  (Limited-edition hardcover coming in 2010)

• SEE LOOK INSIDE THIS BOOK FOR ADDITIONAL FEATURES AND SAMPLE PAGES

Owning a first-edition version of Despair’s gorgeous and historic paperback isn’t just an investment in your betterment. It may be the investment of a lifetime…

In the fullness of time, who knows? Who can even begin to speculate about what a first-edition version of Despair’s gorgeously-illustrated re-issue of this profound work might someday be worth?

Could a first-edition print of Despair’s The Rise of Mr. Ponzi- already a steal at $29.95- soon find its own value quickly inflating? Double, tripling, even quadrupling in value in only a very short period of time- as other fans of historic autobiographies learn of the incredible scarcity of such a singularly important book? A book which certain anonymous-but-nevertheless-extremely-influential luminaries within the investing community have referred to as, “The number-one must-own holiday book for the 2009 gift-giving season!”

And who dare even begin to dream what sort of interest this book might generate for that huge audience of modern Ponzi-scheme victims out there? Those fleeced by the lesser Ponzi acolytes like Madoff and Stanford? Will they not – upon learning of the dwindling supply of first-edition Ponzi autobiographies – react in an immediate impulse purchase of the work? Can they resist the temptation to seek sweet solace for their bitter wounds by hastily buying one copy- (or many)- so as to gain a deeper insight into the mind of the Con Man? Would they not be willing to pay many times the original purchase price in order to have an invaluable first-edition copy of Despair’s release of The Rise of Mr. Ponzi?!

THE MIND BOGGLES AT THE POTENTIAL WEALTH THAT MIGHT CONCEIVABLY BE RETURNED TO THOSE ENTERPRISING SLICKERS WHO HAD THE FORESIGHT TO INVEST QUICKLY- WHILE THE WINDOW OF OPPORTUNITY WAS BRIEFLY OPEN!!! HURRY UP, DON’T BE CHUMP, SEE? BUY IT NOW- OR YOU’LL BE THE WISEGUY WHO FINDS HIS HEAD iS BEING WRAPPED UP IN A BIG BIT OF COLORED PAPER THAT SAYS,”SUCKER” ALL OVER IT! YES, I’M TALKING TO YOU, MUG!

(Can you tell my bedtime reading has been for the last three weeks? I thought so…

By the way… If you want to Twitter about this amazing new investment opportunity, here’s a helpful tweet- ready to go!

DESPAIR.COM unveils the INVESTMENT OPPORTUNITY of a LIFETIME! It’s Ponzi’s autobiography! http://cli.gs/rgRuzB

As the holiday shopping season quickly approaches- we’ve received more and more emails and phone calls from folks asking (frequently with a petulant huff), “What happened to the Retirement Party page- I bookmarked it, but now it’s gone- right when I was ready to shop!” or “Where are those Clearance Sale items I saw? I was going to pick up some posters for (INSERT NAME OF PERSON THEY APPARENTLY DON’T CARE MUCH ABOUT HERE)- but now I can’t! Help!”

The answer- then and now- is that Despair only puts Clearance Items on the website once-in-a-blue-moon, when we’re trying to free up a few palettes in the warehouse for new overpriced swag, or for Fall Catalogs, or for beer or something.

Sadly, as I’ve pointed out more than once, some folks out there simply don’t read our Wailing List promotions very carefully. (I know it’s not the best written newsletter in the world- as I can reliably receive dozens-to-hundreds of emails of rebuke or correction after any grammatical error or spelling mistake. Thank you SOOOO much for that, by the way… Like I don’t have enough problems…)

Because folks frequently DON’T read carefully enough, they often reach incorrect conclusions. Such as those folks who operated under the false assumption that- when it came time to do some holiday shopping, they’d be able to find a bunch of bargain-basement posters or retired DespairWear tees at Despair.com… Despair doesn’t keep clearance items perpetually on the site- especially not when catalogs start being mailed!

Nevertheless, we’ve received enough sad sack sob stories from people who made an ASS out of U and ME to briefly offer a respite. But listen carefully. We’re putting them back on the website for 6 hours only. We don’t want this sale to end up on dozens of coupon code and bargain hunter websites and end up being enjoyed by those who aren’t core customers. So you’ll have to get in- do your shopping fast- and get out.

If you missed out and you want a chance at discontinued DespairWear tees for $7.95 to 9.95, or discontinued Demotivator lithographs for $6.95, or Demotivator vinyl adhesives for $7.95, or whatever- you’ll have to visit this link starting tomorrow morning at 8am Central Time. You will have until 2pm to get in and grab what you want and close the sale.

PLEASE NOTE: The username and password WILL NOT WORK until tomorrow morning at 8am. So don’t write emails saying,”I can’t get this to work!” because it will not work until the morning.

PLEASE ALSO NOTE: The discounted 12 month Demotivator calendars will be still be discounted to $15.95 until 2pm, as well. After that, they return to their standard price of $19.95.

My apologies to those of you on the other side of the globe who might be forced to shopping at some strange hour in order to get in on the deal. I know most folks would prefer to shop while they are at work- rather than have to give up valuable free time at home. But I’d still encourage you to set an alarm and take advantage of this. Y’all frequently get hosed on the international shipping rates and the various extortion rackets your Customs Offices run- but if you make the effort to order during this 6 hour window, it still might net out as a bargain for you in the end. And that’s DEFINITELY not something that happens every day!

So. Any questions? I recommend you send them to me via Twitter. It’s easier / faster for me to handle them there. Plus the 140-character limit spares you my characteristic verbosity… Which has been on full display in the course of this email.

Hasta!

REMEMBER!

The USERNAME is whiners. The PASSWORD is begone. The link is here. And the 6 hour sale window lasts from 8am Central Time to 2pm.

MONDAY AT 8AM CST- DESPAIR WILL UNVEIL A PRIVATE HOLIDAY SALES EVENT SO EXCLUSIVE WE CAN’T EVEN TELL YOU ABOUT IT UNTIL SUNDAY NIGHT.

This is it. Coming Monday morning, Despair will invite you- the Wailing List subscribers- to partake in perhaps the most radical promotional event Despair has ever undertaken.

How radical is it? It’s Smash-Your-Computer-And-Tear-Your-Larynx-Screaming-Obscenities-At-Despair Radical. It is the first marketing promotion in Despair history that I- your humble Marketing Peon- have been able to completely define myself- without interference from marketing Higher-Ups (and only slight interference from the one Marketing Lower-Up, Heidi the Intern).

The only constraint I was given- imposed by Dr. Kersten himself- was that I couldn’t announce it until 12 hours before the event starts- because, in his words, “If this gets out too early, you’ll have a ton of outsiders trying to game it. And that can not be allowed to happen.”

So- Sunday night at 8PM CST- I will mail out the complete parameters of this promotion to Wailing List subscribers. The promotion will begin 12 hours later- Monday at 8AM CST.

About it- I can say only the following as hints. Yes, it will include new Demotivators (including the one that I wrote above!). Yes, it will break many rules of Conventional Marketing. Yes, items ordered during the promotion window will arrive before Christmas. (Oh, and Heidi wants me to add that if it fails, it will probably result in me being fired, or at least demoted to something actually lower than an Intern. Thanks, Heidi!)

But- if it succeeds? Well, I’m going to look like the Marketing Genius I have long asserted myself to be (on those occasions when I wasn’t complete disavowing my profession entirely and pretending that I was a promising Screenwriter.). I might even get a bonus or– dare I dream– a Promotion? Not to burden you with my problems, of course. I don’t want to try to Guilt Trip you into buying something, just to validate me as an employee and maybe get me the chance I’ve been dreaming about- to actually get promoted to the Writing Staff. Nor do I want to try to frighten you into buying something during MY FIRST COMPLETELY ORIGINAL MARKETING PROMOTION by invoking the horrors of what the Wailing List might turn into if I was fired and its authorship was turned over to a 20-something year-old SMU Marketing Graduate who worships at the altar of the Neiman Marcus catalog and might turn it into something like this.

“Wait- wait a minute!”, you blurt, shaking the cobwebs off, “is this some sort of total psyche-out? Is this part of the promotion? Trying to shame me into making you look good in front of your superiors by spending money to validate your first promotion? What kind of cheap, emotionally manipulative marketing mind games are you trying to pull?”

Hey. I said it was radical. I meant it.

Find out how Radical by checking your email Sunday Night. Around 8PM CST. And prepare to be infuriated!

As long as I’m emotionally manipulating you, why not join my My Twitter Followership? Some Austinite named Lance Armstrong started started Twittering the same day I did and he’s already got 5x as many followers! What’s up with that? So he rides a bike- I can do that, too! But can he turnaround an Inline Click-Thru Report on a mailing of 125,000 emails while chewing gum and singing along in a pitch perfect imitation of Vanilla Ice’s now definitive version of Bob Marley’s Buffalo Soldier. I think not!

Heidi, reading over my shoulder, wants to know, “Who is Vanilla Ice again?” That reggae guy you keep playing?”

And you call yourself a Dallasite.

UPDATE: Last Chance on Christmas Tees

LESS THAN 48 HOURS AFTER LAUNCH, THE DESPAIRWEAR LIMITED-EDITION CHRISTMAS TEES ARE ALMOST GONE

NOTE: You really may want to read this email all the way through.

If you’ve toyed with the idea of buying one of our Limited-edition “Nice Shot” Christmas Tees but haven’t yet acted, you’re running out of time! Less than 2 days into the launch, the majority of our tees, illustrated by the world’s greatest T-shirt designer Glenn Jones- has already been sold. At these rates, we fully expect to be pulling them from the website permanently within less than 48 hours!

Remember- there are TWO variations available of our “Nice Shot” Christmas Tee. The Official Limited-Edition Version (depicted above)- and the Unofficial “Employee-Edition” version of the shirt (depicted under the links below).

LINKS:

“Nice Shot” – Limited-Edition Christmas Tee (1,000 only, includes certificate of authenticity.)
“Nice Shot” – Employee-Edition Christmas Tee (Smaller run only for Despair Employees and Wailing List / Twitter / Blog Subscribers).

PLEASE NOTE: Orders including either (or both) tees should start shipping by December 11th. All will be shipped by the 15th. So get them NOW if you are going to get them!  Supplies are almost out!

On a totally unrelated note- 20,000 denizens of Central Texas swarmed upon the Austin Convention Center yesterday to attend the “Get Motivated” Super Seminar. As economic conditions worsen dramatically with each passing week, and more and more Americans face fears of job or financial losses, the worried masses came to hoping to pick up some words of encouragement from multi-millionaire political figures, real estate flippers, and motivational gurus- none of whom will ever have to worry about money again.

But hidden among the chanting, singing, dancing (yet quietly terrified) masses was a small band of heretics- a group who held beliefs tantamount to blasphemy to every soul in the room. They were employees of Despair, Inc. – The World’s Leading Purveyor of Demotivational™ products. And they had cameras.

If you want to see some of what we captured- follow my twitter feed. (I’ll be uploading pics and videos in the days ahead- and followers of my feed will be the first to see them.)

See- aren’t you glad you read this all the way to the end?

This week, I have no special product promotions or coupon codes to push (though I just tested the coupon codes from last week’s promotion and they apparently are still active if you missed out on the discounted calendars).

Instead, I’m going to simply flog my new personal Twitter feed. Want to follow it? Click here: http://twitter.com/wailinglist.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. So I’ll back up a bit.

I received an email last week from my boss, the VP of Online Marketing. Remember her?  It was entitled simply, “You’re promoted! Let’s discuss at Happy Hour at 5!”  The body of the mail said only, “Yes, I’m serious! Congratulations! You’re going to help the Marketing Department unleash the forces of Web 2.0 for Despair!!!” And it closed, as always, with the sign-off, “your boss, j.”

I kid you not. Whatever delusions I harbored about being promoted to the Writing Staff at Despair after authoring a new product were naive. One original, quotable aphorism apparently does not a true writer make…

Longtime readers of the Wailing List may not be surprised to learn that I immediately dove into my most trafficked of Bookmark Directories (”Escapes”) and started looking (again) at job postings on Monster.com. The pickings were unfortunately slim as is perhaps not surprising in this economic climate, and given the fact that every job interview I’ve had during my many years at Despair seems to go poorly (particularly when they learn who my current employer is), I steeled up the courage to meet Jennifer at her preferred east-side inebriation station, Nuevo Leon.

I arrived 20 minutes early, hoping to preempt her arrival and thus have at least few lucid exchanges before her descent into an oceans of triple sec, lime juice and Pretzel-salted drool. Unfortunately, there was some confusion about the time zone. (I assumed she meant Central Standard, as opposed to Newfoundland Time.) But, as Jennifer often says, and one can occasionally discern, “Anytime is the right time for a glass of tequila with a shot of lime.”

(Incidentally, will some subscriber to the Wailing List with far worse taste in music than I have tell me if this is a Jimmy Buffett lyric or an excerpt from some old Joe Walsh concept album I’ve never heard of- or something? As she stumbled her way through the line, she kept looking at me as if expecting I would help her complete the couplet and I unfortunately had to leave her hanging…)

The details of our conversation are better left to your imagination.  The sum of it is this. My new “promotion” apparently isn’t the sort that includes an advancement in rank or position or salary. Instead it seems to entail simply an increase in my responsibilities, a tiny budget, and a new mandate to “Launch the company into Web 2.0 overdrive.”  Like, now.

Yes- I can hear thousands of you groaning already. Web 2.0 is so 2004 and was ill-defined gobbledegook to begin with. According to Wikipedia, Web 2.0 was defined in 2006 as, “…the philosophy of mutually maximizing collective intelligence and added value for each participant by formalized and dynamic information sharing and creation.”

If the Internet has proven anything, it is that the fanciful, cyber-libertarian notions of “collective intelligence” that can be “maximized” by “dynamic information sharing” were just pure rot to begin with. If anything, the Internet has unleashed collective stupidity on a scale never before imagined… (Leeroy Jenkins, anyone?)

But remember, Despair didn’t even have a blog until August of 2007. So it seems entirely fitting that we are only just now aiming to catch up with that which was rendered passé several years prior.

Given the futility of my mandate, the paucity of my new budget ($500/mo), and the complete lack of guidance or direction I’ve received, I have decidedly modest goals. I was unironically encouraged to “do something historic”- and so that is my intent.

It starts withmy Twitter feed. (Those of you unfamiliar with Twitter can learn more about it here- but a simple explanation of it is that it is instant-messaging meets a blog- whereby subscribers can follow me on my daily journey through various mundane duties, irritating conversations, pointless revelations, whatever I choose to write about. The catch- no message can be longer than 140 characters. Think of it as blogging live in haiku.)  I don’t expect most of you to subscribe- this being an admittedly throwaway outlet.  But I’ll have a hard time convincing my boss this was a success if I end up with only a couple of dozen subscribers. So please, some of you, help!

I take as a given that Twittering is a largely pointless exercise that seems best suited as an outlet for narcissists and input for stalkers. Having been both in my lifetime, I can admit that earlier versions of myself might have rapturously embraced it as liberating. I harbor no such illusions now.

Admitting to its insufficiencies, Twitter nevertheless gives me exactly what I need to usher in ‘the Web 2.0 era at Despair‘. Namely, it gives me cover to do other things.  Things otherwise impossible.

My inaugural Twittering event- inarguably historic by my definition- will be to host the World’s First Whisky Tasting Via Twitter. Starring myself and a couple of Despair friends, sponsored entirely by Despair.  When life gives you lemons…

Those subscribing to my Twitter feed will get to join us on a historic voyage- as we imbibe and describe up to $500 worth of Single Malt Scotch Whiskies at a well-stocked bar in Austin. The Nose. The Palette. The Finish. Each will be described in 140 characters or less by Despair’s finest occupants of the lowest blocks on the Org Chart, until we run out of money.

In order to make this a ‘multi-camera’ experience, I will be setting up Twitter feeds for two-other Despair employees*. In this way, subscribers will be able to follow each feed in relative real-time. You’ll get three different perspectives on several of Scotland most-acclaimed whiskies (and occasional product placement for Despair.com, so as to keep this, er, legitimately promotional…). I’ll post those other Twitter feeds at my own Twitter site before the event. So follow me if you dare as I use the mandate of “unleash the forces of Web 2.0″ as political cover for turning my marketing micro-budget into a Entertainment Allowance for the Unsung Heroes of Despair.  Namely, ME.

Oh, and please buy Despair products so I can keep my cruddy job!