The gifts your modern mum really doesn't want this Mother's Day

Want mum to be spoiled this Mother's Day? Avoid the Stone Age gifts says Nadia Stevens. Photo / Getty Images

COMMENT

It was the end of a 10-hour work day. I'd collected the kids from school and kindy and hooned into the supermarket to beat the pre-dinner rush.

It was like any other day, and I am like any other Mother.

Zipping around the aisles with high heels and hungry kids, I grabbed my supplies before heading towards the check out when I was stopped in my tracks.

Standing before me, in prime position, was a shelving display packed with can openers. Not unusual I know.

What irked me was the marketing signage emblazoned across the top: 'Happy Mother's Day – Sunday 12 May'.

Surely a joke? Well actually – no.

A few paces to the left – another Mother's Day gift stand – this time for tea towels. And it gets better, the next stand for the As seen on TV Swifty Sweep. "It's like a broom and dustpan in one". You guessed it – the marketing suggested it was a perfect gift for Mother's Day.

Don't get your mum teatowels this Mother's Day. Photo / Supplied

Well not this Mother!

On what marketing planet was this dinosaur concept created? What loon thought this would resonate with the modern kiwi mum? Why are we – in the home of the suffrage movement - still subjected to such offensive advertising drivel?

I put every ounce of energy I have into jointly raising my young family with my husband.

It is offensive to see that all I am worthy of for such a tough job is a pair of tea towels.

How about this: let's avoid being sucked in to the marketing hype of Mother's Day.

Let's thank our beautiful, smart, loving, hard-working mums with thoughtful words and kind actions.

The Swify Sweep may not be the perfect gift for mum either. Photo / Supplied

Avoid spending your hard-earned cash on junk items that reinforce negative ideals.

And in future, I challenge our big corporate retailers to think long and hard about the damage caused with out-dated perceptions of what Mother's want and need.

I'm telling you now – it's not a bloody can opener! (And FYI…. I am rather partial to a brand-new pair of high heels).