I didn’t get where I am today without trying to lighten up occasionally. Let’s face it - the use of comedic devices to support Economics teaching can be just the job, especially in these austere times. With all this talk of comprehensive spending reviews, double dips and student financing, we all need something to put a smile on our faces.

Take product characteristics. Students can tend to focus too narrowly on price; this is of course a key component of a product offering, but there are so many more: customer service, guarantees, availability of complimentary goods, style, reputation and quality to name but a few.

A high quality product will allow the company in question to extract an additional price premium. Wouldn’t it be amusing though if the opposite were true? This put me in mind of one of my favourite pieces of comedic writing, taken from the peerless Reggie Perrin series. Reggie has opened a chain of shops called GROT, which have become fabulously successful. His USP is that everything sold in GROT is guaranteed to be absolute rubbish – the brand makes a virtue of a complete lack of quality in everything it sells. Reggie is explaining his idea in a TV interview:

Interviewer: Tell me Mr Perrin, how did you get the idea for all this in the first place?

Reggie: It’s really not such an extraordinary idea. Most of our economy is based upon built in obsolescence – I just build it a bit further in. The things are obsolete before you even buy them. I haven’t gone as far as I’d like to. Ideally, I’d like to sell things that fall to pieces before they even leave the shop. What a gift to capitalism that would be! “Oh – it’s fallen to pieces. I’ll have another one.” “Certainly sir.” “Oh - that’s fallen to pieces too. I’ll have another one.”

Watching this clip can bring out a veritable plethora of discussion topics from students on the price / quality trade-off, the calamitous consequences of poor quality control (Toyota, anyone?) and best in class use of quality to increase producer surplus – BMW, Waitrose, Apple – the list goes on. Enjoy your Friday – and smile more often!