Lessons From a Trump Family Christmas: Always Be Branding

Pop Culture

Ah, the office Christmas party. How do you survive it? What are the strategies and the tactics? One is to go have a drink, exchange a few pleasantries with the boss’s spouse, eat a festively shaped jalapeño popper, and say, “Ugh! The babysitter!” out loud to no one, but near everyone, and then go meet a friend for dinner. Another is to get so blitzed that you don’t remember it at all, essentially teleporting to morning. And still one more is to fold the office party into the family party and just get it all done. If you go the multi-tasking route, consider sharing many, many photos from the night so it can work as a kind of family Christmas card and advertisement. This only works when you have a family-owned company, and like making money off your family dynamics.

The latter is a perfect route for families like the Kardashians and the Trumps. It’s a nice situation what with their name on the Trump Organization company, the sons in control, and their father the president. They had their office party at Trump Tower in New York, and dad was everywhere, just like Holy Trinity and Santa Claus. He was there, in the Christmas trees on MAGA ornaments, per photos that Don Jr. shared on Instagram. He was on the wrapping paper, his little red face fit to pop over and over again (you can buy the paper, of course, per Don Jr, via Don Jr’s site). There were also the caps that have come to signify their old man shoved among the branches. Stop me if you’ve heard this one before, but the personal is the political, and the political is the personal.

This is a bit of a departure for these folks. First this family came with branches made of ice nightmares, and then they came with trees made of blood nightmares. It was chic, not homey, minimal and cold, not warm and aglow. It’s fashion, baby. It’s the White House. But at Trump Tower, all the president’s family could be a little more traditional. They could welcome a perfectly glassy-eyed Santa, whose lap Don and Don’s girlfriend could sit on. They could say what they meant, which is here at TrumpOrg and America, it’s all Trumps all the time.

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