Granny-selling brand lovers are taking over

THERE’S a reason branding has the same name as a method used to scorch identification marks onto the backsides of cattle. It’s painful, humiliating and stinks of something rotten.

Branding doesn’t just brand products — it brands people — and increasingly it’s branding them as morons. It’s a case of never mind the quality, feel the price, and if you can feel it all the way to six pay cheques hence, then it’s definitely a case of must-have.

The world is now divided into two kinds of people: those who would sell their granny for a “I’m not a plastic bag” bag and those who yearn to add the words “but my owner’s brain is polyurethane”. But often it feels like the granny- sellers are taking over.