Theodore Levitt's marketing myopia

Journal of Business Ethics

Volumn 18, Issue 4, 1999, Pages 397-406

  Grant, Colin ^a  

^a MOUNT ALLISON UNIVERSITY   (Canada)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 0040315002     PISSN: 01674544     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1023/A:1005817506423     Document Type: Article

References (45)

1. The title is derived from the title of one of Theodore Levitt's articles "Marketing Myopia" (Harvard Business Review 38(4) (Jul./Aug. 1960): 45-56; reprinted in Harvard Business Review 53(5) (Sept./Oct. 1975): 26-28, 33-34, 38-39, 44, 173-174, 176-181; reprinted in The Marketing Imagination (New York: The Free Press, 1986): 141-172. In this article, Levitt argues that companies that see themselves as producers of particular products, rather than as more broadly catering to human needs, are in danger of missing opportunities that may mean their own survival. His classic example is the buggy whip industry, which might have survived into the era of the motorcar, if it had seen itself in the transportation business, rather than as a producer of buggy whips. The present article argues that Levitt is subject to his own kind of marketing myopia, in his failure to recognize how the marketing he advocates really involves the selling of consumption as a fundamental source of human meaning.
2. The title is derived from the title of one of Theodore Levitt's articles "Marketing Myopia" (Harvard Business Review 38(4) (Jul./Aug. 1960): 45-56; reprinted in Harvard Business Review 53(5) (Sept./Oct. 1975): 26-28, 33-34, 38-39, 44, 173-174, 176-181; reprinted in The Marketing Imagination (New York: The Free Press, 1986): 141-172. In this article, Levitt argues that companies that see themselves as producers of particular products, rather than as more broadly catering to human needs, are in danger of missing opportunities that may mean their own survival. His classic example is the buggy whip industry, which might have survived into the era of the motorcar, if it had seen itself in the transportation business, rather than as a producer of buggy whips. The present article argues that Levitt is subject to his own kind of marketing myopia, in his failure to recognize how the marketing he advocates really involves the selling of consumption as a fundamental source of human meaning.
3. The title is derived from the title of one of Theodore Levitt's articles "Marketing Myopia" (Harvard Business Review 38(4) (Jul./Aug. 1960): 45-56; reprinted in Harvard Business Review 53(5) (Sept./Oct. 1975): 26-28, 33-34, 38-39, 44, 173-174, 176-181; reprinted in The Marketing Imagination (New York: The Free Press, 1986): 141-172. In this article, Levitt argues that companies that see themselves as producers of particular products, rather than as more broadly catering to human needs, are in danger of missing opportunities that may mean their own survival. His classic example is the buggy whip industry, which might have survived into the era of the motorcar, if it had seen itself in the transportation business, rather than as a producer of buggy whips. The present article argues that Levitt is subject to his own kind of marketing myopia, in his failure to recognize how the marketing he advocates really involves the selling of consumption as a fundamental source of human meaning.
4. Theodore Levitt, Marketing for Business Growth (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1974), pp. 201-206.
5. Although advertising is generally understood as a component of marketing, Levitt is not concerned with this distinction. He calls an article "The Morality(?) of Advertising" in one publication (Harvard Business Review 48 (Jul.-Aug. 1970): 84-92) and "The Morality(?) of Marketing" in another (Marketing for Business Growth (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1974), pp. 246-258.).
6. Although advertising is generally understood as a component of marketing, Levitt is not concerned with this distinction. He calls an article "The Morality(?) of Advertising" in one publication (Harvard Business Review 48 (Jul.-Aug. 1970): 84-92) and "The Morality(?) of Marketing" in another (Marketing for Business Growth (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1974), pp. 246-258.).
7. John Kenneth Galbraith, The Affluent Society (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1968), "Introduction," p. xxvii.
8. Ibid., p. 131.
9. Ibid., p. 129.
10. Theodore Levitt, The Marketing Imagination (New York: The Free Press, 1986), p. 153.
11. Ibid., p. 164.
12. Ibid., p. 167.
13. Theodore Levitt, "Exploiting the Product Life Cycle," Harvard Business Review (Nov.-Dec. 1965), pp. 81-94.
14. Maurice I. Mandell, ADVERTISING, Fourth Edition (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1984), p. 176.
15. Levitt, The Marketing Imagination, p. 36.
16. John Kenneth Galbraith, The Culture of Contentment (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1992), p. 134.
17. An obvious response at this stage, which Levitt himself would almost certainly endorse, is that of course any adequate view will have to recognize both marketing and selling. Although there is merit in this academic expedient, it misses the central point, that one of these approaches will be basic. The claim of this article is that Levitt's own treatment provides vindication of Galbraith's selling priority, in spite of his own insistence on the crucial importance of marketing. Any focus on the consumer is ultimately driven and guided by the interests of business itself.
18. Levitt, The Marketing Imagination, p. 36 (Emphases from the original.).
19. Ibid., pp. 36-37.
20. Ibid., p. 37.
21. Ralph Glasser, The New High Priesthood: The Social, Ethical, and Political Implications of a Marketing-Oriented Society (London: Macmillan, 1967), p. 12.
22. Levitt, Marketing for Business Growth, p. 9.
23. Ibid., p. 13.
24. Levitt, The Marketing Imagination, p. 216.
25. Ibid., p. 165.
26. Ibid.
27. The form of this section title is a parody on Levitt's article title, "The Morality(?) of Advertising." See note 3 above.
28. Levitt, The Marketing Imagination, pp. 127-128.
29. Theodore Levitt, "The Morality(?) of Advertising," Harvard Business Review (Jul.-Aug., 1970), p. 88.
30. Theodore Levitt, "Are Advertising and Marketing Corrupting Society? It's Not Your Worry, Levitt Tells Business," Advertising Age (October 6, 1958), p. 90.
31. Ibid., p. 91.
32. Abrham Maslow, "A Theory of Human Motivation," Psychological Review 50 (1943), pp. 370-396; and Toward a Psychology of Being (Princeton: D. Van Nostrand, 1962).
33. Abrham Maslow, "A Theory of Human Motivation," Psychological Review 50 (1943), pp. 370-396; and Toward a Psychology of Being (Princeton: D. Van Nostrand, 1962).
34. Levitt, The Marketing Imagination, p. 226.
35. William Leiss, The Limits to Satisfaction, An Essay on the Problem of Needs and Commodities (Kingston and Montreal: Queen's University Press, 1988), p. 58.
36. Ibid., p. 57.
37. Levitt, "Are Advertising and Marketing Corrupting Society? It's Not Your Worry, Levitt Tells Business," p. 91.
38. F. A. Von Hayek, "The Non Sequitur of the 'Dependence Effect,'" in Beauchamp, Tom L. and Norman E. Bowie (eds.), Ethical Theory and Business (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1983), p. 364.
39. Levitt, "Are Advertising and Marketing Corrupting Society? It's Not Your Worry, Levitt Tells Business," p. 92.
40. Northrop Frye, The Modern Century (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1967), pp. 27f.
41. Glasser, The New High Priesthood, pp. 99f.
42. Fred W. Graham, "America's Other Religion," Christian Century, March 17, 1982, p. 306.
43. Jim Wallis, The Call to Conversion (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1981), p. 49.
44. Levitt, The Marketing Imagination, p. 37.
45. Ibid., p. 38.