Branding as, Well, Branding -- the Kind That Really Burns

While we're on the subject of aesthetics and treating amputees with respect when you are in the business of serving us, especially when we have something sensitive to relate to you, would somebody please explain to me why some prosthetic manufacturers consider it acceptable to afflict every poor benighted amputee they're lucky enough to get to buy their product with a brand name printed in huge and often irremovable letters all over it? 

Look at this picture of Bonnie's leg.  (Do not talk about the green and yellow; we will not discuss the green and yellow here as she has already declaimed eloquently on that particular violation.) 

Now tell me:  Why on earth is it necessary that Bonnie should have to wear the brand name C-LEG for the rest of her life?  Why, Otto Bock, why? 

Oh, and Cadence Technology, don't think you're getting away with anything.  Your (my) knee chassis cost more than $2,000 all by itself, with an additional two grand plus for the shin that houses it, yet when I went to peel off the brand name ('cause it was all over the back of what had effectively become my new calf muscle, in white-on-black 72 pt. sans-serif type, oddly not pictured in any of your or Endolite's web pix*) I discovered that the little marks along the dial that tell me and the prosthetist how to set the hydraulic tension were printed on the same sticker, and that I could not remove the name of your company without also diminishing the precise functionality of my right leg! 

Really! 

True story!

Don't you think that:

(a)  you could have afforded, and I certainly deserved, to have those numbers stamped into the metal?

OR

(b) if it would have somehow been too expensive to pursue option (a), perhaps you could have afforded to make one decal for the numbers, which I need to keep, and then a separate decal for your freakin' brand name, which I don't?

OR

(c)  you don't really need to put your brand name all over my leg in the first place?

Dudes.  Given the fact that so many people can't afford and so many others don't even want cosmetic covers for their artificial limbs, please, please try to remember that anything you put on the outside of a prosthesis might just turn out to be the same as forcing an amputee to wear a tattoo, or worse, a brand.  Like cattle, not like Coca Cola™ -- or kind of like both at the same time.  For life.  Everywhere s/he goes.  No matter what s/he wears.  No matter what kind of business or entertainment s/he might be trying to conduct.

Look, I'm grateful for the technology, really.  But don't you think I've been through enough?  And don't you agree that I should, no matter what, choose what name(s) if any will be tattooed on my person?

My body is not a billboard.  The prosthetics you make for me are supposed to be part of my body whenever I wear them.  You want a piece of this?  Well, no, you can't have it, but even if you could, I'm sure you're aware that there are time-honored procedures for this type of transaction which are far less rude than forcing me to choose between wearing your name and giving up some portion my mobility.  You could at least ask first, and offer to pay me.  Or you could buy me dinner.

Thanks.

___

* I guess I should be grateful.  Everywhere this shin is pictured online or in the printed materials which came with it the hydraulic component is bright red with royal blue 72 pt. sans-serif type.  I guess white on black is an improvement.  I guess.

Geez.

(back up)

Comments

[Ron Sullivan]

Can that sticker be divided with an Exacto knife and the brand name lifted off?

(Guess I'm in one of those Helpful Moods.)

I wonder if the makers have just never got beyone the Tommy Hilfiger/Pay-to-wear-my-logo mindset. Pah. Sabotage is in order. Think of the folks who improve billboards.

[Sara]

Oh, believe me, Ron, those stickers came off as soon as I could take them off -- not the numbers, just that brand. There are no brand names anywhere on either of my legs, thank you very much! Blech.

Now, to be fair to Cadence Technology, they actually sprang for a whole three decals. There was the aforementioned branding wrap around the entire tube of the hydraulic component, which is all of a piece with the extension setting gauge. This has been hacked. I can't get the whole thing off without dismantling my shin, and this would void whatever warranty might still apply, so I am loath to try it or let Brilliant Engineer Boyfriend try it, even though he is, well, brilliant. So there's still a stray C or H that can be seen around the blue "HOPE" bracelet I stuck on. (Making these bracelets and selling them through PayPal was one Democrat's response to the last presidential election. I am a liberal, but I don't trust John Edwards and I thought "Hope is on the way!" was one of the lamest campaign slogans ever -- like, how 'bout "Hope is here!" or "Help is on the way!", know what I'm saying? But I like having a little blue silicone bracelet with the word "HOPE" imprinted on it wrapped around my shin, and it does cover up trace elements of offensive and unremunerated branding.)

The second decal is the gauge for flexion adjustment. Through no effort of my own, it is already dogearing and will probably fall off.

The third decal was a silvery disk around the top, flat portion of the assembly. It had the brand name in about 44-pt. black sans-serif type, and my serial number for this unit. It is in the file with the instruction manual.

Seriously, all by itself, this portion of my leg was billed while I was insured at $2,016 and change. I am not kidding when I tell you how pissed off I am that for that price Cadence Technology could not see fit to just stamp this information into the materials.

I wouldn't pay a dollar for a Tommy Hilfiger shirt. (I didn't attend that university. heh heh) But even if I did pay for one, it would be because I had shopped for it and chosen it from a rack of other shirts. Prosthetics purchasers don't have the same kind of range of options that clothing purchasers have.

Also, amputees in the US comprise only about 6% of the population, and fewer than that actually wear prosthetics, so exactly whom are manufacturers trying to reach with this kind of branding? Because I live and work near an Air Force Base and a veteran's hospital, I see rather more amputees on any given day than most people. Yet not once has another amputee ever come up to me and said, "Nice knee chassis! Is that a Cadence?"

It's opportunistic marketing of the worst kind. It serves no function for the amputee, and I can't even believe it's all that profitable for the manufacturer. Prosthetists know what the different brand names are, and all the big, external pieces from all the different brands are distinctively shaped and only function with a limited number of other components, so it's not like the prosthetists are going to get the different parts mixed up in the workshop or be swayed by who has the coolest looking brand ID. Reputable prosthetists choose components and systems on the bases of what a patient's resources will cover and what the patient wants to do with his/her life.

Grr.