Religion Watch Archives

Monitoring Trends in Religion - From February 1990 to January 2016

  • Home
  • About
  • Contact
  • Archives
    • By Issue
    • By Article
    • By PDF (2008-14)
    • By PDF (1985-97)
    • All Articles
  • Sections
    • Current Research
    • Findings & Footnotes
    • On/File
  • Google Search
You are here: Home / Archive / Spirituality seeping into worlds of sales and advertising

Spirituality seeping into worlds of sales and advertising

September 1, 1997 by Richard Cimino

Print-friendly

As the boom of spirituality continues its course through church life and personal devotion, such a resurgence is also finding a growing presence in advertising and sales — two areas of the business world long considered hostile or indifferent to such expression.

According to writer Andy Cohen in Sales and Marketing Management magazine (August, 1997) an increasing number of sales managers and promoters are turning to such practices as opening sales meetings with prayers, in closing their office doors during business hours for meditation, and attending programs which aim at blending spirituality and business success.

For instance, the motivational program known as Peter Lowe’s Success has already attracted over 400,000  attendees this year, rising sharply from l996. Directors of programs for training of sales personnel are encouraging their  staffs to know their own value systems so they can better understand those of their clients.

Believing that the rough and tumble world of competitive sales will not  become “omnipotent in Corporate America,” proponents of the new spirituality find reason to think that their convictions are now being given a new, more sympathetic hearing in the marketplace. Further evidence of the new trend is presented in American Demographics (June). Advertising simply has absorbed the new public interest in spirituality and turned it into new programs to promote sales.

IBM’s Solutions for a Small Planet campaign has several religious themes. Nuns go to vespers while speaking of OS/2  computer networks. Eastern monks meditate telepathically about Lotus Notes. Nissan presents as a hero a wise, aging Asian guru, backed in the sound track by Eastern mystic music Chevrolet uses spiritual themes for its  “Confessions,” as well as draw on eco-theology to promote its Chevy Taho products.

The author suggests that the new public receptivity to spirituality has led to a greater acceptance of religious themes in ads.

(Sales and Marketing Management, 355 Park Ave. South, New York, NY 10010; American Demographics, P.O. Box  68, Ithaca, NY 14851-0068)

— By Erling Jorstad

Print-friendly

Filed Under: Archive

Also in this issue

  • Findings & Footnotes: September 1997
  • Islam increasingly attracting former Marxist intellectuals
  • Cease fire doesn’t stop religious nationalism in former Yugoslavia
  • Current Research: September 1997
  • Immigrant churches grow in Canada while staying in own orbit
  • New African churches attracting interracial following in US
  • Is fundraising equal to soul winning for televangelists?
  • Marian movement pressing for new doctrine
  • Mainline denominations face ecumenical, gender issues in summer assemblies
  • Indigenous and eclectic religious faiths find following in Russia

Search the Site

Download the first issue of RELIGION WATCH (1980)

Download the first issue of RELIGION WATCH (1980)

Click on the image for downloading

© 2016-2020 Richard Cimino / Religioscope
·News Pro Theme · Genesis Framework by StudioPress · WordPress