Selling a Lifestyle

Brooks Brothers ads (which I see online often) really hit me with their lifestyle-selling - more so than other ads, although I realize many do this. Here is an example I got from the Washington Post website.

You are rich. You don't just live in a house, but rather you have a compound of buildings all in the classical style. Your yard is perfectly manicured, with a pool. Most of your days are spent taking your adorable, tow-headed children with you to pleasant garden parties and other outings. Perhaps croquet or badminton is to be played on the lawn.

One way you can tell the people are upper class (as though there weren't plenty) is that the men are wearing somewhat girlish colors (yellow, baby blue, lavender). This is a kind of upper crust privilege; regular men of the proletariat wear much more macho tones.

The pair on the left are clearly a couple. The woman on the left may be a bit more youthful and free-spirited than the one on the right; we can tell because she has gone out with her head uncovered. Is the woman on the right married to the slightly elderly gentleman? Perhaps she is a youthful grandmother to the two boys. Or perhaps she is the gentleman's daughter, and her husband is out practicing his remunerative but respectable profession.