Kmart’s Ship My Pants Disrupting the Schema

I may be a little late to the party, but like many other internet users, I too saw the Kmart Ship My Pants video and thought it was a perfect mix of humor, information and marketing. In case you missed it, take a look.

Needless to say, the main reason this video garnered so much attention is because it sounds like “shit my pants.” As a 25-year-old kid, I have no problem with the verbiage. Ask a 65-year-old mother and you may have a different opinion.

However, looking at it through my marketing mind, I couldn’t praise Kmart’s creative and risky spot any more.

Like all marketing, we want people to talk about our products. In addition, we also want to inform the public of new services. This spot does both because it did a terrific job of disrupting the schema of the typical consumer.

What does that mean? Steve Knox, who I believed coined the term, said it best in a 2010 Fast Company article.

“You have many schemas operating at one time,” Knox said. “Here is one that you likely used today: When you got in your car, you had a schema that you would drive on the right-hand side of the road, and the person coming at you would drive on his or her right-hand side. You don't think about it. Your brain simply makes the assumption that this is how the world works.”

But what is someone was driving on the left-hand side of the road? Chances are, you would mention it to the next person you communicated with. Why? It disrupted your schema.

These types of ads are not common in our culture anymore. Some question the tactic, but the good marketers don’t run away from disrupting schemas. They welcome it, just as Bill Kiss, chief digital officer for Sears and Kmart, did for developing this ad.

“I wouldn’t call it hesitation,” said Kiss when asked if he had second thoughts. “I would call it healthy and direct conversation and debate. There was a lot of that. But I’m a marketer at heart so I know that if you really want to disrupt and get the point across, sometimes you need to break some paradigms.” In other words, you need to do something others won’t expect, like driving on the wrong side of the road.

Not that I have started shopping online at Kmart, but I truly applaud their marketing and risky behavior on their Ship My Pants campaign.