What's In Your Wallet

I can't stand those Capital One commercials. They're cheesy (though they have been less bad as of late).

Capital One and I have a long-standing relationship. They turned me down for a job in a call center 10 years ago, and I have never forgiven them. It's not that I was a good fit for the job - I actually met the woman who designed the testing standreds for Capital One, and after looking through my file, she told me that telling a call center manager you want her job is not the way to get hired.

But that's all in the past. The real problem I have with Capital One is they keep sending me offers for their credit cards. I've had Capital One cards in the past - mainly when I was broke, owed a lot of money, and Capital One was the only company who would give me reasonable credit at a reasonable rate.

As I improved my financial situation, I cancelled those cards and looked forward to the day when Chase Manhattan and Citibank would agree to take me back into their fold. Every credit card offer from Capital One was a reminder that I had made poor choices in the past. And every tacky commercial reminded me that I was an undesirable to the cool credit card brands.

See what I did there? Yes, I'm talking about brands. Capital One is a fine company - they treat their people well, they treat customers fairly, they avoid predatory lending practices, and managing your credit with a Capital One card is a good way to improve your financial situation.

And yet, using your Capital One card is a daily reminder of past failures.

Branding is funny like that. As consumers, our choice of companies is often based on a brand, and not the way the company treats us. So I'd like to offer a truce. I'll stop thinking bad things about Capital One, and they'll work on those commercials to try to amuse me more, or at least annoy me less.

In the meantime, we should all take a look at the brands we use and why we use them. We may find our desire to be cool to get in the way of smarter decisions.