Getting down on the Farm

Strange. She doesn't look so upset about being abducted while a State Farm agent looks on approvingly with a decidedly creepy look on her face. Meanwhile, a sandwich is eaten.

My agent didn't look like this. We find that unbuttoning our shirts leads to higher customer satisfaction.

State Farm.

Say it with me. It just rolls off the tongue. State Farm.

Think about it, though. “State.” And “Farm.” State Farm. The name conjures up images of a government run co-op. Yet it’s an insurance company.

A commercial they’ve been running recently shows three guys chillin’ around the house. Suddenly their ribald conversation is interupted by a baseball crashing through the window. No problem, says one of the young men. He sings, “Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.”

Poof! A pretty, vivacious agent is standing in the living room. “Hey, Dave,” she says. Wow, she even recognizes her customer! And she’s dressed nice, too, her shirt unbuttoned pretty darn low. I won’t even go out in public with my shirt unbuttoned that low.

It's a State Farm hot tub party! Hey baby, is that clipboard waterproof? I'm about to make a claim on some damages!

The young men quickly realize the power of the State Farm jingle. So they bust out with their second wish and waste it on … a sandwich??? Seriously? WTF! That had better be one damn good sandwich.

Then the customer ramps up his game, though, into some good oldfashioned sexist kidnapping. “And the girl from 4E,” he says, and suddenly his hot neighbor is sitting next to him on the sofa, sitting cross-legged with her laptop. Apparently she was doing some computing when she was abducted by the guy’s State Farm agent.

The state is now set. The three young men now have two attractive females in their domicile and their sandwich. Everything is ready. The third young men now gets in with his wish.

“And can I get a hot tub?”

Woop, there it is! That agent must be holding one powerful clipboard, eh?

The baseball is forgotten and we all know what happens next.

As the scene fades, the announcer wraps it all up nicely. “Find out what else State Farm agents can do for you.”

So, if you live in an area prone to be hit by baseballs, and you like abducting women, sandwiches and hot tubs, make sure you consider State Farm as your insurance company.

Funny, back when I was a State Farm customer, I never met my agent a single time. She had legions of secretaries who did all that stuff. In fact, I never even talked to her on the phone a single time. And I can guarantee you she wouldn’t recognize me by sight. And when I did put in a claim, not only did I not get my wishes answered, they canceled my policy for the audacity of putting in a claim once. (Something that almost cost me my chance of buying a new home when no one else would cover me, either, after one claim in 20 years.)

And they call that being a good neighbor?

“Sorry, Bob. I appreciate you helping me with my house six times in the last five years, but when we made that deal my fingers were crossed. I’m afraid I can’t help you fight that fire right now. Survivor is on! Good luck, buddy. Let me know how it works out.”

Insurance companies don’t exist to grant wishes. They exist to take your money and deny claims. That’s how they turn a profit. That’s what they do.

A 2007 investigation by CNN reported that major car insurance companies, including State Farm and Allstate Insurance, are increasingly fighting claims from those injured by their insured members. In some cases the settlement proposed amounts to just $50 or the threat that any lawsuit would be made so expensive and time-consuming that it wouldn’t be worth the victim’s time. State Farm and Allstate have denied these allegations. This followed on the heels of criminal investigations by the states of Louisiana and Mississippi, which found that State Farm had wrongly denied claims stemming from Hurricane Katrina. (Source: Wikipedia.)

Perhaps insurance companies should make real commercials rather than ones that look just like a horny adolescent’s sexual Weird Science fantasy.