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We made “I Survived the Quake!” buttons

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That’s right, Spacing has created a spur-of-the-moment souvenir: I SURVIVED THE QUAKE! The buttons retail for $2 and come in blue, green, orange and pinkish-purple.

You can buy the one-inch buttons from our web site (dropped in the mail the next day) by using your credit card at PayPal for the low-low price of $1.50 (includes shipping). Specify which colour you want in the message option of the order.

For $2 and some immediacy, you can also drop by  Swipe Books (401 Richmond St. W — beware they close Friday for the G20), Outer Layer (577 Queen Street W.), and the Spacing office (215 Spadina Ave.). We’re on the 1st floor in suite 160 (our office is on the left side of the suite, #171). Our office opens at 11am Thursday.

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18 comments

  1. I think it’s called a ‘tremor’, not a quake. We ate these for breakfast in Japan.

  2. The Paypal function isn’t working! Help! I want to buy!

  4. Rosie:
    We think we’ve fixed the Paypal problem. Use Firefox if you can — that seems to be working for everyone.

  5. Done! What if I forgot to specify colours? I’m all shook up and my brain isn’t working… 😉

  8. Is this Spacing’s “jump the shark” moment?

  9. It doesn’t say when it happened or where. Talk about generic.

  10. I think it’s insulting to a country like Haiti that you’ve created something like this. 

    I wouldn’t be caught dead wearing these buttons out of respect for all those who lost their lives in Haiti.

    Your slogan makes it sound like you are trivializing the whole situation of an earthquake.

    Would you still make the buttons had the earthquake brought Toronto the same type of destruction as it did Haiti?

  11. to G20:

    If people had died in Toronto we would certainly not be selling them. Since hardly anyone suffered, this is a fun little project that will peter out in a few days. This is our way of poking fun at our culture.

    Proceeds go to the magazine — we’re a small business with a miniscule margin of profit and need to find creative ways to make ends meet. This is one small way we do that.

    Matthew Blackett
    publisher of Spacing

  12. Really, G20?

    You are taking these buttons way too seriously. Somehow the buttons are disrespectful to victims of Haiti? What about the quake in China? Or San Francisco in 1988? Has Spacing offended all earthquake victims throughout time? Is the nickname of the San Jose Earthquakes soccer team offensive to these vicimts as well?

    Was the headline early yesterday — “Tsunami warning for G20 fake lake” — disrespectful to the 2005 tsunami victims?

    Righteous indignation will only take you so far. Hope you do not injure yourself getting off the high horse or I might not be able to use that phrase in the future as to not offend you.

  13. Fantastic idea! Heading over to Dark Horse for a americano and a button.

    PS: don’t worry about nay-sayers; truly unimaginative people.

  14. Wow, you really got the usual negativity squad out in full force with this one!

    Maybe they don’t realize that it’s tongue-in-cheek.  I think it’s a cute idea and I picked up a couple of buttons this morning.  Oh, and A.R. — generic?  You do realize that that’s the CN Tower on the button, right?

  15. It’s my first earthquake. It’s a big deal.

    I bought a button, and I’ll wear it proudly.

  16. Will: It’s a stylized and generic looking CN Tower that would be barely identifiable to anyone outside of the city. Plus, we’ve had one of these in the past. So it doesn’t even say which “quake” was survived (by not indicating a year). Thus, it won’t have much meaning beyond a couple of months.

    Lame.

  17. AR: 1000 buttons sold trump your one lame comment, hate to say.

    Also, date of the quake is on the rim of the button, not shown in the graphic. And, its made for Torontonians, so if someone outside the city doesn’t identify it that’s their loss.

  18. Some people will throw their money away on anything.