Recently I criticized Metlife's use of the Peanuts characters as not making a lot of sense for insurance advertising, at least in the way they employ them. So here I will illustrate some (joke) examples of how they might be employed in ways that might make sense for insurance ads.
1.) Lucy's psychiatric practice: As we all know, Lucy has a psychiatrist stand where she sells her psychiatric services for 5 cents. Well, let's say that some insecure kid comes to her for help, and she bullies and berates him, and then he commits suicide. Well, if she had her malpractice insurance through MetLife, then she wouldn't lose her cardboard box office to foreclosure, and the angry, grieving family would get some compensation for her ineptitude and unqualified advice.
2.) Schroeder's piano playing: Let's say that Schroeder's father is secretly a gambling addict, and he gets deeply indebted to some local mobster. So in order to encourage him to pay his debts, they smash Schroeder's piano. Well, since he's insured through MetLife, the piano is replaced. But he still doesn't pay his debts, so the mobsters break Schroeder's fingers. Oh, but he is insured through MetLife, so his healthcare costs are all covered! And then when his father gets bumped off for failure to pay off what he owes, Schroeder and his family are well provided for due to his father's generous life insurance policy with MetLife.
3.) Lucy and the football: Lucy just loves to pull the football away at the last second, sending Charlie Brown flying. Well, one of these days, he might just get badly hurt, and his family might sue Lucy's family for pain and suffering, as well as medical costs, seeing as how Lucy does this all the time and her family does nothing to punish her for it. (Think Charlie Brown is to blame for falling for it again and again? Forget it: With out current legal climate and political correctness, there is no such thing as personal responsibility anymore as far as choosing to do irresponsible things that get you hurt are concerned.) Well, knowing what an irresponsible bully of a daughter they have, they've insured her for liability, and so they don't lose their home when they lose the lawsuit: MetLife pays it all!
4.) Snoopy and the Red Baron: Hey, we all know Snoopy loves to get into dogfights with the Red Baron, right? Well, he constantly gets shot down, and so it's really just a matter of time before a stray bullet of his hits someone, or else his doghouse crashes onto some innocent pedestrian on the ground. Well, if he's insured against collateral damage from his militarist activities through MetLife, he won't lose his doghouse like that cartoon dog in the Peachtree Financial ads.
5.) Linus and his blanket: As we all know from the Charlie Brown TV specials, Linus is rather psychotic in his addiction to a security blanket. He even gave it to Charlie Brown for luck in a Spelling Bee once, but he had awful withdrawal symptoms, so his parents, apparently at the end of their ropes from his whining, allowed him to take a bus to Washington, D.C. alone to go retrieve it (!!!). Oh, my God: He could have been seduced by Mark Foley! Oh, but had he insured his security blanket with MetLife, he could have had a new security blanket in no time!
