Stuff White People Like

“Racial Shift in a Progressive City Spurs Talks”

By: William Yardley
The New York Times (temporary ban has been lifted due to fantastic photo)
May 29th, 2008

Summary

Portland struggles to figure out how to create diversity without affecting property values. It is not easy. Fortunately, things are being solved through awareness.

Best Passage

“I’ve been really upset by what I perceive to be Portland’s blind spot in its progressivism,” said Khaela Maricich, a local artist and musician. “They think they live in the best city in the country, but it’s all about saving the environment and things like that. It’s not really about social issues. It’s upper-middle-class progressivism, really.”

Ms. Maricich, 33, who is white, spoke after attending this month’s meeting of Portland’s Restorative Listening Project.

Things Mentioned

• Being Offended
• Awareness
• Gentrification
• Diversity
• Barack Obama
• Non-Profit Organizations
• Bicycles
• Knowing What’s Best for Poor People
• Indie Music
• Coffee
• Dogs (photo)
• Expensive Strollers (Book)
• Portland, OR (Book)
• Native Wisdom (Book)

Thanks to Yolonda for being the first of many to send this in.

Photo by Brian Lee

www.BrianLeePhoto.com
www.BrianLeeWeddings.com

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“Scavengers on the Urban Savannah”

The New York Times, Sunday April 13th, 2008

by Guy Trebay

Stuff Mentioned

• Vintage
• Having Gay Friends (Extra points for Transgender here)
  
• Awareness
• Manhattan (Now Brooklyn too!)
• Graduate School
• Hating Corporations
• Gentrification
• Diversity

Best Quote:

“I graduated Princeton in ’92 and moved to Williamsburg in ’03,” [Mr. Butler, the Brooklyn Flea Market organizer] explained. “I bought on old fixer-upper in ’04 and started the site, and I realized I was miserable working on Wall Street and that Manhattan was only for rich people and felt played.”

“Brooklyn, and particularly Fort Greene with its heterogeneous population, had “so much more soul and texture,” observed Mr. Butler (who actually lives in Clinton Hill), echoing a view voiced by many before him, probably beginning with Walt Whitman or, anyway, Spike Lee.”

Worth Noting

Please take a look at the slideshow to show the fantastic “texture” of people at the event.

Change in Policy

The white people of New York have been properly documented. This experiment has shown that they are featured in at least one article in every Sunday New York Times. As a result, we have concluded our study of white people in the New York Times and will no longer take submissions from the New York Times. Instead, we hope to expand our search to help document how white people thrive in environments other than New York

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MINNEAPOLIS, MN (PR Newswire) – The Target Corporation (TGT) has purchased the popular blog “Stuff White People Like” (https://stuffwhitepeoplelike.wordpress.com).

Starting April 1st, 2008 the nation’s second largest retailer will use the site as a promotional tool.

“We are thrilled at the opportunity,” says Ennis Blentic, Senior VP of Marketing at Target. “It’s a great chance for us to connect with some of our most valued customers and let them know about our great product line for 2008 and beyond.”

The company plans to have the regular writers do one post per week with the rest of the week devoted to posts that inform and educate customers about Target products.

The first campaign to be featured on the site will be for Target’s new line of Fresh Organic foods called “Tanner Farms.”

The brand new product line promises to deliver top quality organic vegetables, fruit, meat, organic cereal, chocolate, bread, and pasta to every Target store throughout the United States.

“We feel as though our customers would be better served if we offered a full organic grocery option in all of our locations,” says Blentic. “We can’t think of a better way to promote than through this amazing viral blog. We are also hoping to add user generated content where people can send stories, videos, and art about how they use Target organic foods in their daily lives.”

Blog founders Christian Lander and Myles Valentin will be retained as consultants.

“I’m really happy to be working with Target,” says Lander. “I think this is a great partnership and a true step forward in the future of advertising.”

“White people love Target!” joked Valentin. “But in all seriousness, we could not have selected a better corporate partner. I think Target’s new organic line will really change the way that people eat and shop.”

Regular readers of the site will be offered free shipping on their next order at Target.com with the code “STUFFWHITEPEOPLELIKE.”

About Target

Minneapolis-based Target serves guests at 1,613 stores in 47 states nationwide by delivering today’s best retail trends at affordable prices. Target is committed to providing guests with great design through innovative products, in-store experiences and community partnerships. Whether visiting a Target store or shopping online at Target.com, guests enjoy a fun and convenient shopping experience with access to thousands of unique and highly differentiated items.

Update: White People enjoy April Fools 

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The combination of white people and books has been a pretty solid combo for the past few hundred years. So whenever a white person is given a chance to write a book, it’s considered a pretty big deal. This is especially true when it happens to someone who started a blog that they never expected to reach more than 100 people.

Our research has slowed in recent weeks as we worked out the details, but Stuff White People Like are proud to announce that our textbook on white people is becoming a reality.

http://www.randomhouse.com/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780812979916

The book will feature 2/3 all new content and is going to be released by Random House in August.

But that does not mean that the site will stop examining the stuff that white people like.

If you’d like to receive updates about the site or about the book, please sign up for the email subscription service on the right sidebar.

Also worth noting: white people like having their dreams come true when they least expected it. Thank you to every single person who has read the blog, written in, or shared it with their friends via email, IM, or personal blog. 
                                                                                                              – Christian

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Leaving Behind the Trucker Hat by Allen Salkin in The New York Times, March 16, 2008.

Stuff referenced:

1. New York Times
2. Non Profit Organizations
3. Organic Food
4. Arts Degrees
5. Brooklyn
6. Hating Corporations
7. Farmers Markets
   
8. Having Two Last Names
9. Irony
10. Study Abroad
11. Microbreweries

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