The Attention
Getters |
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By Vince Basehart
In this age of sun-blotting billboards,
national do-not-call registries, where
advertising is everywhere; in a time
when public toilets advertise beer
and pay-per-view boxing matches, it
gives one an oddly satisfying feeling
to find people engaged in raw, unadorned
salesmanship.
You’ve seen these people --
the Attention Getters -- in front
of auto dealers, on street corners,
in front of newly opened electronics
stores.
The Attention Getters’ forebears
wore sandwich boards which read, “Eat
at Joe’s.” They were carnival
barkers or town criers.
There is a distinct arc in the career
of the Attention Getter, and a clear
hierarchy. There is perhaps no better
place to observe the birth, rise,
acme and descent of this calling than
the streets of Santa Monica.
A recent Saturday afternoon tour
of the city yielded a few examples:
A pack of teenage girls wearing cut
off shorts and tank tops were flagging
down cars for a high school benefit
car wash off of Ocean Park. Although
the lowest form of attention getting,
hawking for a benefit car wash may
be its purest form, where the artist
must simply use one’s natural
talents to gain the attention of the
passer-by. The girls shouted at startled
drivers, and interlocked arms to do
Rockettes-style kicks. Behind them,
boys slopped suds onto vehicles.
Outside of a large national sandwich-selling
franchise, stood a nine-foot-tall,
anthropomorphic submarine sandwich,
complete with polyester leaf lettuce,
tomato slices, cold cuts, sesame seed-studded
Italian roll and googly eyes. It was
over ninety degrees this afternoon,
hot enough to curdle mayo, and the
person inside the sandwich must have
been sweltering.
Yet, the costumed Attention Getter
-- who occupies a respectable rung
on the ladder of the profession --
has the soul of a performer, and so
knows the show must go on. The giant
sandwich danced in place and waved
at passing cars in that exagerrated,
children’s theater manner. At
times he gestured with open, imploring
arms, or would hook a thumb back at
the store behind him. But he never
stopped moving, never stopped selling.
At the corner of Wilshire and 8th
was a sign spinner, a point-of-purchase
marketing professional, an Attention
Getter who had reached the pinnacle.
Sign spinners can make some real money,
but, as in professional sports, this
level of income is rare and the realm
of the young, fit and focused.
He was young black man with short
dreadlocks, and was spinning, tossing,
cart-wheeling, cork-screwing and flipping
his arrow shaped Open House sign into
the air. He had the moves of a Vegas
juggling act, knowing right where
to find the handles on the arrow’s
return, always ending with the arrow
pointing up 8th.
Finally, on Lincoln, in front of an
automotive electronics store, I saw
where it can all end. He was a man
closing in on 50, hard-muscled and
leathery from many years of outdoor
Attention Getting.
He was clad in a gold, red and green
jester’s outfit. It was a high
quality costume, with jangling bells
sticking out from each point of the
star shaped head wear, a one-piece
tunic which puffed out at the thighs,
and green tights which led down to
shoes which ended in curled tips,
also adorned with jangling bells.
The man held a fluorescent orange
sign promising expert automotive widow
tinting and stereo installation. You
could see it all in his unshaven face
-- his start, his promising rise through
the business, up to and including
the sign spinning big leagues -- and
now, his ignominious end, neither
a costumed Attention Getter or a sign
spinner, but something in between.
He was like a grizzled master sergeant
who had taken a swipe at a young punk
lieutenant and was busted down a couple
of stripes. His gaze was fastened
on something far beyond Lincoln Boulevard
as he smoked a cigarette, listlessly
rocking the orange sign back and forth,
his dignity shredding with every jingle.
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