Us-versus-them positioning

The pattern

This still is filed under Us-versus-them positioning.

Define

The buyer is invited into a side. The product is what we use. The named other is what we refuse.

Mechanism

Identity contrast. Choosing the offer is choosing a group. The out-group does as much work as the claim.

Verdict

The category is crowded

Why it works

The headline measures the worker's part in the smallest unit he controls, the minute, and hands each one to a named man, General Pershing, instead of to a vague war effort. The picture shows where those minutes go: a riveter at work on a ship's hull, the yard's gantries behind him, drawn from below so he stands as tall as any soldier.

The big idea

Every minute a shipyard worker saves is a minute given to General Pershing, so driving rivets into a hull faster becomes a personal service to the general.

The offer

No product for sale. The poster asks shipyard workers to waste no time on the job.

Lines from the ad

MAKE EVERY MINUTE COUNT for PERSHING

UNITED STATES SHIPPING BOARD EMERGENCY FLEET CORPORATION

Steal this when

You need people to speed up routine work, and can tie each unit of their time to one well-known person who is waiting on the result.

The emotion

Written to Duty. It makes the Say move.

It sets the act at the smallest unit the riveter controls, the minute, and hands each one to a named man, General Pershing, while the hull behind him shows what those minutes build.