Personal
Foul—Making the Call
Against
Nationwide
Personal Foul, Nationwide (Indefensible),
Penalty: Loss of Millions of Policies,
Automatic Ejection From the Insurance Game
We
wore our protective gear because we almost always do. It’s part of recovering from
the nasty pass life dealt us. We are the parents of dead children and we
watched the Super Bowl last night. A championship game on TV should have been
safe, but it wasn’t. Early in the game, we received a blow most foul when
Nationwide aired their dead-child ad. Nationwide: You face-masked us in the
worst possible way. You pulled our helmets off, stripping us bare, and then
slapped us in the face.
Yes,
accidents happen. We know that better than most. We certainly know it better
than whomever your ad agency is. (By the way, fire them.) Bereaved parents of
children who died as a result of accidents live with the results of such
accidents every day. (My child did not die from an accident, unless one could
call brain cancer an accident of nature.) You don’t need to remind us about
accidents that claim the lives of children. You especially do not need to
remind us on a Sunday evening when all we want to do is cheer on our favorite
team.
Perhaps
the American insurance-buying public will be the commissioner who sets some new
rules and not only shuns you, but bans you. Nationwide, you had an opportunity
to make amends for your foul. You didn’t and, instead, in the most blatant show
of unsportsmanlike conduct, stood by your ad because accidents do happen.
I
doubt it will be an accident when your shares drop and the number of policies
you score falls to an abysmal level.
Shame
on you, Nationwide. You’re definitely not on our side.
Thank you to Melissa Lima Panagos
and my grandson, Mathew Wiley, for their assistance in football terminology.
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