Of the myriad perks that come along with working at a major international agency, perhaps the most impressive of all is the free packets of Quaker Oats oatmeal that are yours for the taking--along with, get this, free hot water.
This morning I dug deep into the corrugated box containing the little 1oz. packets of oatmeal and saw these words printed in 96-point type on the top of the box. "FRAGILE. THIS SIDE UP."
Believe it or not I was quickly jump-cut to the legal department of Quaker Oats and the three weeks of billable time they spent declaiming on why oatmeal is fragile.
I didn't go to law school. I don't even watch "Law & Order," but it seems to me that if you drop oatmeal it won't get more mealy. Likewise if you ship it or store it upside down nothing that bad will result.
I would love someone's legal opinion on this. But I probably couldn't afford it.
I once designed pure-pak card board containers for a juice company. the lawyers probably made more money on scrutinizing the wording and design on some little, almost hidden, basically unnecessary instruction on how to open the pure-paks safely than i did designing the whole thing. Lawyers have cornered the world. They play off each other and the rest of us are footing the bill.
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