[ MAUKA MAKAI ]

SHOEBOX

(Inside the card)

"Personally, I think I deserve
an increase in allowance just for
not bein' this guy."

Happy Father's Day

Our cards
belong to Daddy

Not just your father's
holiday anymore

Guys no like mushy stuffs...

---

By Scott Vogel
svogel@starbulletin.com

To get a Father's Day card these days, the last thing you have be is a father. In fact, believe it or not, most of the 97 million cards opened today will have been addressed to someone other than the addressee's father (54 percent of them, to be exact, according to Hallmark). In part this is due to those considerate souls who mail cards to their grandfathers, and thoughtful wives who do the same for their husbands, greeting card companies having expanded our definition of the holiday to make a buck.

But there's something else going on, a phenomenon that's as much a product of sociology as marketing. We're talking, of course, about the changing face of the American family, and specifically the large number of children whose principal male role model -- when one is present at all -- is somebody other than the guy who married Mom. So you can't really blame companies like Hallmark or American Greetings for capitalizing on a national malaise. And besides, there's an upside to this. Should future civilizations someday come across a fossilized version of the Father's Day racks at Longs Drug Stores, they'll have a handy window onto the Zeitgeist circa 2001.

Even today, a walk through the greeting card aisle can be a bit like studying the cave paintings of ancient cultures. One learns, thanks to Hallmark, that dads lead feverish, frenetic lives from which they desperately long to escape, to no avail.

COVER STORY

"You know those Sunday afternoons when you have no place to be?" begins one, as if such days come once in a blue moon, while another begs for idle moments -- "On Father's Day, we like you to sit down, relax, and take your shoes off" -- and a third reminds us "How beautiful it is to do nothing and then rest afterward."

Clearly these cave-dwelling dads led distorted existences (no wonder they died so young!), their lives moving at a velocity that was not lost on their children, whose quality time was squeezed into the brief periods of inactivity to which the cards refer.

And notwithstanding changing images of masculinity and fatherhood, not to mention companies' sensitivity to current lifestyles, it's amazing how many cards seem trapped in a 1950's time warp depicting dads watering lawns, playing golf, barbecuing steaks, etc. But once again that might be intentional, as the wizards in the Hallmark editorial department have discovered. "Research ... reveals consumers feel more comfortable talking about mowing the lawn or changing the oil in the car than expressing more heartfelt feelings toward dad," says a company press release.

And indeed a casual perusal of the Longs shelves provides strong evidence for the Hallmark claim. Some of the cards are virtually contentless, one reading only "Hi, Dad. It's me. Love you. That's all." (It's part of the "Simply Stated" collection.) Whether such a card is an honest depiction of the no-nonsense father-child relationship or merely a reaction to the unrelieved sappiness of Father's Day cards past, we'll leave that for historians to decide.

If a card isn't working the minimalist angle, chances are it's trying really hard to be funny. This, at any rate, is the M.O. of "Local Kine Cards," Maile Way Products' foray into the Father's Day market. ("F is fo' all da funny kine sounds your body makes"... "R is fo' da roaches you kill with great ability.") Once again, the cards shed light on the mysterious relationship between fathers and children, one that obviously can be strong (according to a Gallup poll, 9 out of 10 fathers say they their kids appreciate them enough) but which leaves both sides fumbling through a joke when they're not at a loss for words.

Again, the Hallmark factory is instructive. "As one consumer told us, 'I can get away with being over-emotional with Mom at Mother's Day. I can't do this with Dad or it is viewed as insincere'." If that's the case -- and any heartfelt expression of gratitude is immediately seen as suspect -- it's no wonder the bond between dads and kids is so often fragile. (Is that why Longs is completely sold out of its "Dad, for all the times I didn't tell you" cards?)

But that's no reason to panic, as thankfully there seems to be no shortage of father figures willing to pick up the slack, the Longs racks packed with paeans to "blended families" (the industry's name for our new-fangled domestic arrangements), even if the messages themselves sometimes mirror the confusion felt by the population at-large at the pace of societal change.

"We may not be a traditional family," one helplessly offers, "but whatever we are, it works, because you are here for all of us."

American Greetings, Hallmark's main competitor, is also getting into the act, addressing "today's often 'non-traditional' family structure with cards appropriate for stepdads, guardians, uncles and others who may be the primary male caregivers in the family." And Hallmark leaves even fewer stones unturned: "Any nurturing man -- 'big brothers,' brothers-in-law, uncles, neighbors and others who are 'like a father' -- is likely to be honored on Father's Day."

In other words, just about everyone has been identified as a possible recipient of a Father's Day card this year, just as nearly anyone, given time and the proper inclination, can bestow critical, father-like love on a child. So go check your mailbox -- you might be surprised.

---

MAILE WAY PRODUCTS

Guys no like
mushy stuffs—mo’ betta
go make ’em laff

As goes the nation, so goes Hawaii, at least when it comes to Father's Day cards. Gayle Machida, the president of Maile Way Products (which manufactures "Local Kine Cards") confirmed that humor is the order of the day in her line.

"I think mothers have a good sense of humor too," she said, "but with dads ... I don't know how to put it. There's a lot of sentimental dads too, but they don't want to get mushy with the day."

Available at Longs and specialty stores all over town, Machida's non-mushy pigdin cards celebrate everything from Christmas to birthdays, Chinese New Year to "trips to Vegas." Twelve Father's Day cards were available this year, most featuring barefoot or slipper-clad dads who have little use for conventional gifts like ties (except to tie up the trash) but are whizzes at fixing "da toilet wen da thing stay broke."

As Machida puts it, "we try to make it generic in a way so it appeals to all fathers. And of course it has to have a local theme." The company has been producing cards since 1997, a small-business response to "this niche where the market only had cards that were made on the mainland." Sales are good, she says.

"We wanted something for local people, but we've noticed that tourists really enjoy it too."

---

Scott Vogel, Star-Bulletin

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