It’s the time of the season

Thanksgiving Reflections on Tradition and Innovation

Wishing you a stress-free holiday with new traditions and maybe a splash of bourbon. Cheers and Happy Thanksgiving!

We ran to the store this morning to get a few last-minute things for Thanksgiving. A few became a few more, and $139 later, we’re home and I’m working while my husband is prepping food for tomorrow. He has decided to get a head start on cooking this year and has pulled out his go-to Betty Crocker Cookbook to get the recipes. Calling out every few minutes to ask where something is, while I finish up on a client’s holiday ad campaigns and update my blog while waiting for Zoom attendees to login.

If I said this wasn’t a tad bit stressful for me, I’d be lying. I rather like the familiar (somewhat chaotic) rhythm of cooking together and prepping our family’s favorite meals. Yes, we may add a twist to certain recipes or foods some years. (Cooked cranberries and mandarin oranges, or Brussel sprouts with candied bacon come to mind.) But some favorites remain unchanged. (unless we notice a missing ingredient and the store’s closed…)

Thanksgiving growing up always meant going to my grandmother’s house. It was literally over the hill, and through the woods to get there. She was a great cook and made about 5 different pies with the flakiest homemade crust you ever laid a fork into. By the time we got there, the pies were cooling, and she had the turkey and stuffing in the oven, and too many great sides to list! My mom, great aunt, and aunts and uncles all brought something. From Linda’s famous 7-layer salad in a huge, ruffled glass dish that was filled to the brim with mayonnaise, lettuce, peas, and more, to Anitia’s turkey shaped butter for the table. Mom was always up early baking fresh rolls, making sure there was enough extra for us to enjoy hot out of the oven for breakfast before we bundled up and piled into the car for the drive. My Great Aunt Blanche always made the best homemade egg noodles and colorful trays of sweets and goodies that you couldn’t help but try all of them. Food pictures weren’t as common then, so memories must serve as a reminder of the feast and the table settings.

Years ago, I made a cookbook filled with scanned family photos, stories, and our favorite recipes. It is now in the cloud to be retrieved throughout the year. Someday I hope to have it printed, but for now, I print my favorites sheet-by-sheet to use on Thanksgiving or for special occasions. I know the stuffing practically by heart, as it’s my favorite, closely followed (or perhaps tied) with Grammie’s pecan pie (which is my favorite Thanksgiving AND Christmas dessert).

Are you starting to wonder why is this on a marketing page? This year’s “transfer of labor” in the kitchen has me thinking about AI and how it’s taking over a lot of the traditions and “recipes” of the marketing world.

• No time, budget, or props for pictures? AI to the rescue.

• Can’t afford a team to bounce ideas off of? AI is a great sounding board and even gives you “atta-boys” for a job well done.

• Can’t remember the 4-Ps of marketing? A quick search backed by AI will whip out the answer faster than you can whip fresh cream for your pumpkin pie. (bandwidth willing)

This was not written by AI, unless you count autocorrect. But I have been enjoying using AI for photo creation and as a sounding board to supplement my marketing campaigns. My marketing pages are dappled with prompted images, to highlight what I can do for businesses remotely. (Since most of my clients don’t relate to farm life or home cooking.) For those that do, my photography page is still 100% captures with my DSLR camera or iPhone.

For now, AI and marketing works better together. Human tweaks and adjustments to text (and photos) keep it aligned with your brand, and voice.

Sadly, I often see businesses using it verbatim and pasting it without even reading what was written. It’s the Thanksgiving equivalent of buying a pumpkin pie at a box store and calling it Aunt Donna’s.

The tell? The text “Feel free to adjust any part of it to make it more personal!” at the end of the copy. A clue even more blatant than the incriminating pie-box in the trash.

Another tell? A complete change of writing style, and suddenly everything’s “bespoke”.

There’s a time and a season for everything, and AI (and box store pumpkin pie) is here to stay. So, as you adjust to new traditions (and helpers), I wish you the peace of the season, and faith that it will all work out for the best, and a bottle of good bourbon on hand as a back-up if all else fails.

Happy Thanksgiving.