Thanksgiving in the Finch Household

Like many families in the United States, the Finch's love to celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday. It is a time when we gather together our friends and family to give thanks for the blessings we have received in the previous year. Although we don't seem to have any traditions that are out of the ordinary, we still add a bit of our own twist on the standard Thanksgiving celebration.

One constant in the Finch family Thanksgiving meal is a sweet potato casserole made by my mother. She began making the dish six or seven years ago after visiting a Ruth's Chris Steakhouse and trying their wonderful brown sugar sweet potato casserole. She was able to find a recipe for the dish and it has been a hit ever since.

Although my Grandparents didn't celebrate at our home this year, they are a usual fixture at our Thanksgiving dinner table. They always bring a few Tupperware containers full of my Grandmother's award winning (yes, they've actually won awards) cookies. Whether it's the chocolate chip or cherry filled cookies, eating too many of them has become one of my favorite Thanksgiving traditions.

The final strange tradition that we have at my home is that every year my brother and I go out to our

range and shoot. This isn't an intentional tradition, but instead it seems that every year we take a few pistols and rifles to our outdoor range and empty a couple boxes of ammo. I'm not sure why we always do it on Thanksgiving, but this is something that we've been doing since I first left for college 3 years ago. We always have fun and it's a great way to blow off steam. Perhaps this started after we stopped playing backyard football on Thanksgiving.

Looking back at my family's Thanksgiving traditions I can see a parallel between these unique traditions and the principles of marketing. Just as I associate these traditions with spending Thanksgiving with my family, all consumers hold strong associations with products and events. By playing to these associations it is easy to grab an individual's eye and to influence them to engage with your brand.