Phototron: Turning Your Living Room into a “Medicinal Herbs” Dispensary

Despite its cheesy name, Phototron is not a brand of coin-operated photo booths from the 1980s. The real purpose of the Phototron should become crystal clear to you after watching about 1.6 seconds of this TV commercial.

The good news for all you Yoda bong collectors and Woody Harrelson fans is that your favorite hobby is now so mainstream that the Phototron commercial aired on Comedy Central on August 12. The bad news is that the commercial can barely admit what the product is really used for. Not since various “male enhancement” ads refused to name the part of the body they were supposed to be enhancing has an infomercial been so coy about its product. In fact the only acknowledgement of its true purpose comes at the end of this list:

The people at Phototron hope this subtlety will ward off angry phone calls by fooling Granny into thinking this is a product for foodies who have cultivated a habit of using fresh basil and need to keep a stash nearby just in case they get a sudden craving to whip up a pasta sauce.

Subtle also is the set used for this commercial, which makes the whole thing look like an ad for high-end interior décor—as if plunking a curio cabinet full of ganja in the middle of your living room were a mark of exquisite taste and fine breeding.

The combination of the suburban interiors and the attractive brunette host leads one to suspect that the producers of this infomercial were greatly inspired by the Showtime television series Weeds.

The next commercial from this company will feature a nebbish middle-aged man in a classroom selling a device that easily extracts pseudoephedrine from Sudfed tablets—to help students study for their chemistry classes, of course.
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