Cindy

Droog

Read Cindy's bio and previous columns

February 26, 2009

Mention Panties, Freak Out the Corporate Meeting Crowd!

No Boundaries.

None. That’s the label on one of my pairs of panties. It’s the brand.

Now, this is a business column and I am a businesswoman. So, it’s pretty rare for me to discuss my choice of lingerie here or anywhere else, for that matter. Unless of course, I’m in one of those cheesy “team-building” meetings where they ask you – as an icebreaker – to share something that nearly no one knows about you.

I’m still in the camp that an “icebreaker” should be a little bit easier. I mean, you don’t need a sledgehammer to break apart ice, so why do I need a zinger of a question to get to know a bunch of people who I’m not all that sure I want to know?

Still, I’ve got a sense of humor and I occasionally like to exercise it. So, I’ll often do my small part to make everyone in the room just that much more uncomfortable by retorting with, “Every day, I make sure my panties match my shirt.”

In reality, this is only true on four out of five work days each week. But it’s just entirely too much fun to give this answer in a corporate setting, and see people’s reactions. (That being said, I always wear black or white shirts to these meetings, too. I don’t like people’s imaginations to run too wild, so I avoid my leopard-print sweater at all costs.)

So, I can get into boundary destruction every once in awhile.

But when it comes to naming a brand or a product, I’ve got quite a bit of experience involving boundaries under my belt. I once helped named a new telecommunications company. Then, it was a company that made widgets for realtors. Then, a couple of new products.

Naming products and companies is great fun, but I’ve made some boundary-related mistakes in doing this. Once, I pitched the name “Dellego” to an IT firm. Dell was not happy. The cease and desist letter came from their lawyers approximately three days after the web site launched.

Chalk it up to inexperience with humungo and powerful corporate legal teams. At that time in my career, the only person who’d ever tried to sue me was a former employer for breach of contract when I quit. Since I live in an at-will employment state, that one went straight to nowhere faster than he could say “Hey, accounts payable, can you please cut a $400 check to our law firm?”

I also once made the mistake of suggesting the name “personal spiritables” for a line of collegiate memorabilia for people whose offices wouldn’t be complete without plastering unnecessary alma mater items around it. (Confession: Otto the Orangeman is staring at me from the shelf in my cubicle right now. It’s personal. And spiritable – if that were really a word.)

I liked the phrase, but it seems my client thought some people would call “fantasy products” sold at places named “Jezebel’s Closet” the same thing.

My mind just wasn’t dirty enough back then. I guess it is now. Because when I was folding laundry last night, and I read the label that said “No Boundaries” on my undies, I almost choked on my green tea.

I’d never noticed it before. I bought them at Wal-Mart a few years ago. I was on a camping trip and had forgotten to pack any. It didn’t occur to me then how horrific this name was for something decorated pretty cutely, as in, a teenage girl may buy the same ones.

Yuck.

Heck, I’m in my 30s and I have boundaries related to my lingerie. Like, only certain people can touch it. One person, in fact. My husband. At only at certain times – when I choose. And only in certain ways – you get the picture.

So, to the person who made that not-so-wise product-naming decision, I say to you: Thanks so much! From the bottom of my heart.

Dellego and Personal Spiritables are entirely more palatable now. My product-naming past shall no longer haunt me, for you have taken the cake of inappropriateness.

© 2009 North Star Writers Group. May not be republished without permission.

Click here to talk to our writers and editors about this column and others in our discussion forum.

To e-mail feedback about this column, click here. If you enjoy this writer's work, please contact your local newspapers editors and ask them to carry it.

This is Column # CD126. Request permission to publish here.