Excuse Me, But John Howard Has A New Job Flogging $75,000 Mattresses In China
It is exactly as baffling and wonderful as it sounds.
Our second-longest serving Prime Minister, John Howard, is a totemic, polarising and iconic figure in Australian politics. On everything from gun control to the GST to asylum seekers to the Republic, Howard had a profound impact on national politics that resonates to this day. Whether or not you agree with his politics and worldview, Howard is a giant in our history.
He also sells high-end mattresses to middle-class consumers in China.
Hi!
Okay, some context. Yesterday PM Malcolm Turnbull toured the Sydney factory of A.H. Beard, an Australian family-owned company that’s been cranking out high-end mattresses since 1899. Over the last few years A.H. Beard have increasingly looked to China as a market, seeking to snap up customers among the country’s growing middle class who will pay as much as $76,000 for what you’d hope would be a fucking good mattress. Imagine if you spilled tea on it! How would you live with the shame?
Which is where Howard comes in. According to a November interview with Garry Beard, current A.H. Beard chairman and fifth-generation Beard, when the company went to China in 2013 to open a facility in Shanghai, “former Prime Minister John Howard and his wife Janette” tagged along for the ride.
Even better, the Australian Financial Review‘s Primrose Riordan has dug up an old promo video of the visit, complete with Howard wearily extolling the virtues of some fancy mattresses to Chinese customers in front of a gold curtain, a bunch of large suited white men awkwardly stumbling out of a minibus, and John and Janette being led around a mattress facility in polite bewilderment while generic upbeat dance music plays in the background. It is absolutely wonderful.
If you didn’t make it through the whole thing (in which case, shame on you), here are some highlights to mull over:
– These models in cocktail dresses wanly having a pillowfight on a huge bed while Australia’s second-longest serving Prime Minister gazes down in benevolent approval
– John Howard being mobbed for autographs and selfies by a crowd of what I can only assume are starstruck mattress salespeople
– Janette signing the official and legally binding A.H. Beard Wall of Eternal Mattress Loyalty as John watches on solemnly
“This is the price we must pay for quality sleepgoods, wife”
This isn’t the first time a former PM has used their face and name to hustle a bit in their post-politics life. Bob Hawke attracted controversy last year for spruiking failed satellite company NewSat, and Gough Whitlam is one of the main reasons my mum still uses Leggo’s Pasta Sauce
But there’s something especially magical about seeing the guy who once suggested that Australia should reduce its rate of Asian immigration spending his golden years flogging mattresses to Chinese investors. Sleep well, John!
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Story via the Australian Financial Review.