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Strange Advertising

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Keith

22:33 / 30.11.03

Ever seen an advert or billboard and thought "NOPE! they've totally missed the boat on that one"?

The current billboard campaign for Ask Jeeves shows a guy sitting on a stool in what looks like La Senza (upmarket knickers and bra shop) looking utterly dejected as he trails his wife/girlf around on a shopping trip. The message (one assumes) is shop online, don't get bored.

BUT WHAT COULD BE BETTER than going shopping for saucy scants? That would make up for looking at shoe and handbags and saying "mmm... yes, that one!" for hours on end. It'd be "finally, something we can BOTH enjoy"... and it'd be the only time I'd actually WANT to see endless trips to the changing rooms "what about these? should I try the turquoise?" "not half! Tell you what get them both... actually BUY THEM ALL!"

Linus Dunce

00:42 / 01.12.03

Yes, gurl's kneckers are best enjoyed in 3D.

I saw a yoghurt in the supermarket that proudly stated on the label, "No fruit bits!"

Linus Dunce

00:48 / 01.12.03

And what about those WKD ads where the guys humiliate their friends? Yuk yuk yuk. Not only is it a poor ad for the product and social drinking in general, it marks out any consumer dumb enough to buy it as a complete wanker. Thinking about it though, that's quite useful, forewarned is forearmed and all that.

ibis the being

13:58 / 01.12.03

I think the new Nextel TV ads are way off the mark. The ones where everyone in the business meeting/wedding/etc communicates via Nextel direct connect. Not only do they not make any sense, they serve mainly to remind us how annoying those distinctive direct connect chirping sounds are.

Never or Now!

15:48 / 01.12.03

The "Heat" magazine TV ads: "People who actually read this trash are annoying idiots!"

Also there was one a while back, I think it was for AA Insurance, where this couple moaned at each other for a bit, the woman mentioned the product, they moaned some more:

"But my dad always said..."

"Well I'm not your dad alright!"

and then they stuck the telly on. The fuck was that all about?

Keith

16:02 / 01.12.03

on a tangent (BUT IT'S ADVERTISING and MAD) - have you seen the Pirelli callendar this year? Are they on drugs?

adamswish

18:30 / 01.12.03

Yes the blokes in the WKD ad are annoying, although they have some redeeming features (the ad where they ridicule their friend who has been posing on the jet ski is a fine example, the others make me want to punch them).

I still think the wierdest combinations of ads I've ever seen has to be the ad for viagra followed by an advert for Victoria's Secrets lingerie. Just seemed like rubbing salt into the wound to me. Why didn't they get blunt and combine the two ads. Picture the scene, chap in white coat with clip board, either side the best examples of male and female DNA, both wrapped in the latest, sauciest products from a well know underwear company. And a simple voice over: "if you haven't felt anything stir by the time this ad is over, isn't it about time you asked your doctor about viagra?"

That's the award winner in the bag right there

Smoothly

13:32 / 02.12.03

I think your idea might rest on a misunderstanding, Swish:
[Jimmy Carr] The reason old men use viagra is not because they're impotent; it's because old women are so very ugly. [/Jimmy Carr]

Linda Barker, meanwhile, strikes me as odd casting for the Dixons ads. As any fule kno, people only look that smug when they are ripping. you. off. Although appropriate, it's a brand synergy I'd have thought Dixons would be less than keen to impress. Whatever next? Nicky Campbell as the face of Franklin Mint?

Keith

13:57 / 02.12.03

That Russian speaking planespotter off of Airline flogging Euronics White/Brown goods... why?

ps. William FRANKLYN used to do the voiceover for polo MINTS. funny old world...

14:00 / 02.12.03

Did anyone else see the Ladybird chidlren's clothes ad (UK)?
A playground in which eight-year-old boys lip-synched to "Who's the Daddy?" and eight-year old girls chanted back, "You are, Bay-by..." while the camera focused on their gyrating bottoms.

I mean, yes, obviously, commodification of children's sexuality concommitant focus on paedophilia as external alien threat preserving childhood innocence abstinence sex education dribble dribble blah blah fishcakes with tartare sauce.

But DUDE. It's Dodgsontastic.

Smoothly

14:26 / 02.12.03

Spaulding, the Euronics campaign is all about making cooking, and the associated appliances, aspirational. Nietzsche reminds us that "For with Zarathustra even a king may be a cook.".

Zarathustra, thus Spake.

whisperingfist

14:27 / 02.12.03

"Extra! Extra! I know you want more,
I'll give you something extra if you walk through my door,
Extra! Extra! Though I cannot deny,
Terms and conditions apply."

UK, this man is still on your telly.

ONLY NICE THINGS

18:22 / 02.12.03

It should probably be pointed out thst the people complaining about these advertisements are not those to whom the adverts are addressed, although the idea of Linda Barker inspiring anything other than murderous rage is a difficult one to grasp.

However. If anybody identifies as a Lambrini girl without first being tortured into utter self-abnegation, they deserve no mercy. Really. Nothing short of Girls Gone Wild: The Crucible justifies such confession.

I imagine it rather as the occasion of moments of horrible self-knowledge. Raddled slatterns, not so young as once they were, blearing through a drunken haze at the question, seared to their very souls, forced against their will to answer "yes". "Yes, I am a Lambrini girl," as keys slither out of their handbags and into the drain, not to be missed until the evening after.

Bear

18:34 / 02.12.03

UK, this man is still on your telly.

When a new bank opened back home they got him to open it, I kid you not. Not sure what's more scary the fact that they had an official opening for a bank or they picked him as the celeb....

18:53 / 02.12.03

the people complaining about these advertisements are not those to whom the adverts are addressed

So if I had to buy my kids a school uniform, I'd be more keen on them boinging their little arses at the greedy camera?

- seriously, barbanonymity allowing, I suspect some of us may fall neatly into the age, income bracket and gender target market for many of these ads. We drink booze, we like ladies, we shop at Dixons. But we are not WKD boys.
So we're not the target market for the ads - because we don't like these ads? Bit circular. Raises nebulous questions about self-identification, class, advertising, and the central question - how can I sell beer to armchair anarchists, chaos magicians and queer theorists?

As you say, only Lambrini exists wholly outside the sphere of potential self-identification. I shake my head sadly, still trying to expell the teeny tiny pimps from my vision.

Char Aina

09:33 / 03.12.03

my brothers girlfriend drinks lambrini all the time, as a standard.
and i think the WKD ads appeal to a slightly more raucus male sense of humour, of the type found in many rugby changing rooms and pubs across britain.

ya buncha snobs.

Char Aina

09:38 / 03.12.03

i did wonder about lil' kids shaking what cannot realy yet be described as 'booty' for the camera. that was a bit wierd.

and "who's your daddy?" couldn't they have picked a slightly less dodgy line to use? like "give it to me baby, uh huh, uh huh!" fom 'pretty fly for a white guy'?

Regrettable Juvenilia

09:41 / 03.12.03

I've got nothing against "raucous". WKD = "utter FUCKING EVIL FUCKING COCK BASTARD-ous". Ha ha, my flatmates are so wacky, they pretend to be gay when I bring my new girlfriend round! Ha ha.

Mind you, soon Linda Barker will advertise everything. Chocolate hob-nobs, Dutch lager, pensions, Radiohead albums. "I like them, I think you will too", over and over and over again, ceaselessly replicating, Barker without end. It'll be like a world of Agent Smiths, only Agent Barkers.

whisperingfist

10:09 / 03.12.03

Linda Barker is possibly the most manic person I have ever seen in my life. Certainly the most manic person I have ever seen advertising electrical goods. Something about her face just screams "Inside me is an electrical typhoon. One day I will open my mouth and blow a hole clean through your skull." Furthermore, giving her a pair of scissors? That's just plain wrong.

Anywho, has anyone seen that billboard for anti smoking that says "If you smoke, I smoke"? It took me a while to realise it was supposed to be a child's crayon writing and not the work of some long scratchy fingernaily tobacco smoking monster.

Possibly even Nick O'Teen?

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

10:26 / 03.12.03

Call me puerile if you will (and I KNOW you will... I fully admit it) but those L'Oreal (I think they were) ads that were in bus stops in London EVERYWHERE not long ago with the girl smiling as she wiped what I can only presume was the product being advertised from her face, with the words "The best facial is a daily facial" superimposed over them...

...they made me absolutely PISS myself. And I can't have been alone, cos most of 'em vanished after a week or so. Kind of a short time to lease an advertising spot. Maybe someone in the ads department suddenly went: "hold on a minute... don't you think these look a little... well, dodgy?"

Or maybe kids stole them all for glue money, or whatever it is kids steal stuff for these days (I'm so out of touch).

Regrettable Juvenilia

10:58 / 03.12.03

And I can't have been alone, cos most of 'em vanished after a week or so.

There was one on a bus-stop in King's Cross that was there for months, I'm sure of it. Not surprisingly really, WC1X keep it grimey, etc etc.

11:27 / 03.12.03

It took me a while to realise it was supposed to be a child's crayon writing

Yes - it looks like a damaged etch-a-sketch.
Oh, and, getting kids to write your ads for you? Don't. They're shit at it. All that childish perception, unveiled eyes, pithy commentary stuff is bollocks. There's a similarly semi-legible ad on the underground at the moment saying "Pro Life/Anti Knife".
I think it's a project to publicise the amount of knife crime in London. But the eight year old who drew it doesn't know that "pro life" is an anti-abortion standpoint.
And that same eight year old was doubtless outside shaking his thang for the Ladybird film crew minutes later.

_pin

12:59 / 03.12.03

The old Doritoes Friendchips adverts that seem to have vanished, presumably having run out of whacky, modern thing for them to communally do (we've had skirting tactfully around the issue of porn, renting a video and, um... annoying Kelly Osbourne) but FUCK ME they were awful at the time, adn not least because every time I sold one of those enermous bags of flavourless ones to them and some big pots of crappy dip to a large group of slighty greasey , slightly paunchy men, they'd all be going home to consumer the lot in about four minutes, all the time thinking about how great it would be if they could master spontaneous conversation with girls.

Likewise, the KFC Soul Food adverts filled that place with floppy white men dancing with their minds.

And just while we're here, the LOTR-themed Pringles adverts aren't terrible, should someone try and complain, because one of them's just like Flyboy when he's drunk.

DaveBCooper

13:48 / 03.12.03

I was always amazed that one of those Doritos ads didn't get done for nicking the opener of one of the earlier episodes of Friends ("Multiple Orgasms"being the punchline in the boys v girls conversation in both).

I think More magazine have missed the point with their (possibly only London-based?) such-and-such is SO last fortnight campaign. reminds us of the transience of being in, and that refers to this issue by the time next time comes out, does it ? Oh.

And offhand, can anyone - I can't - think of any recent tampon or other sanpro ads which don't somehow seek to show how great the item is by showing men in some way being done down ? The cinema seat-arms one being the latest in a long line of ones where blokes are trying to put tampons in their coffee or eat them as sweets or something else that er, undermines how discreet and not-in-the-foreground the tampons are.

Regrettable Juvenilia

14:18 / 03.12.03

I dunno, I don't think the problem with those ads is that men are belittled - it's the idea that women need to QUICK make up a cover story! Say it's something else! Because your friends and especially your lovers musn't EVER find out about periods! I mean, what? Everyone's being done a disservice here...

Char Aina

14:43 / 03.12.03

i'm with flyboy on that one.
everyone is being treated like a twat in that advert.
still think the WKD ads arent as bad as all that though...

if a new girlfriend isnt into your sense of humour, she may as well know straight away, even if your sense of humour stretches to finding amusement in dressing up like a post-watershed queen viedeo.

i think they really got me with the one set in the showers after football, the one where they keep adding shampoo to their mates hair. that appealed to my sense of humour for sure.

Scrambled Password Bogus Email

14:49 / 03.12.03

If anyone else says anything even slightly less than complimentary about WC1X, I'll start growling...

adamswish

18:13 / 03.12.03

"Inside me is an electrical typhoon. One day I will open my mouth and blow a hole clean through your skull."

I believe the deal is you have to buy Ms Barker dinner first before she reveals this particular talent.

ONLY NICE THINGS

21:33 / 03.12.03

my brothers girlfriend drinks lambrini all the time, as a standard.

The fact that I am saying nothing here will, over time, be recognised by the George Cross.

I reckon we should get Flyboy to phone up and complain about the Pringles ads while drunk. Drunk on Barker.

Whisky Priestess

11:05 / 04.12.03

Barking Mad?

Also there was one a while back, I think it was for AA Insurance, where this couple moaned at each other for a bit, the woman mentioned the product, they moaned some more:

"But my dad always said..."

"Well I'm not your dad alright!"

and then they stuck the telly on. The fuck was that all about?

Ah, well, I happen to know the guy who wrote this, and I can exclusively reveal that it was written almost solely to spite his ex-girlfriend. He recreated an argument they had had almost word for word, cast an actress who looked just like her, and made thousands of cable TV viewers feel hatred and confusion for the ad woman. Sweet, sweet revenge.

The gist of the message being, presumably, "Buy Spanner Insurance and get the bitch off your back!"

Smoothly

11:29 / 04.12.03

But isn't it the bloke who comes across as an utter spunkbubble?
Or is that just me? Perhaps the spunkbubble is in the eye of the beholder.

No star here laces

13:42 / 04.12.03

Well, you may mock the KFC ads in Britain, but the Singaporean KFC ads bring a whole level of utter bizarritude.

The scene: an old blind woman is sitting in a KFC complaining that she hasn't seen her grandson in years. He is sitting opposite her grinning inanely and eating chicken (but not letting on he is there). Suddenly she grabs his hand, inserts his fingers into her old-lady mouth and slathers the chicken grease from his digits. He smiles fondly as her face lights up with recognition of the shape of the fingers in her mouth. They hug.

It kind of has to be seen to be believed.

Smoothly

08:26 / 13.01.04

Has anyone seen the latest ad in the 'Could you...?' recruitment campaign for the Police? The one with Lisa Potts?
For those of you outside the UK, there have been a series of ads in which celebrities acknowledge that they couldn't do various things that the Police are routinely expected to. Lennox Lewis, for instance, tells us that if he were to visit the scene of a 'domestic', where a man used his fists against a woman, he couldn't keep his temper. Patsy Palmer couldn't wear sensible shoes or something. The aim being, one assumes, to elicit the opposite response in viewers. ie. 'Well, I could do that'.

The latest one features Lisa Potts, a primary school teacher who was injured when a man attacked pupils with a machete. The reason she says she couldn't work for the police is that it might involve trawling through evidence of child pornography in order to secure convictions for paedophiles. So, my question is: whom exactly is this aimed at?

Sax

09:53 / 13.01.04

The worst one at the moment has to be the one where the supermarket employee gets a splinter in his finger and is whisked away for TLC as the manager closes up the entire store and goes to mop his brow.

Rather unbelievably, this is an advertisement for careers in the Armed Forces, with the message seemingly being: "Not getting this kind of attention at work? Feeling undervalued? Come and join the Army!"

Where, presumably, you will be given sub-standard equipment, sent to the desert, and killed by trigger-happy GIs.

Jub

09:58 / 13.01.04

good point SW.

On a slightly lighter note: child murder! That's what whoever made the Disney land ad must have been thinking, when he got the little girl to say:

"mum says it's just magical!" Arrrrrghghghghghg!!!!!!

That add annoys me so muc. Not just the practiced precociousness of the two kids, but the smug parents too. And how on earth did the children hear the dad whisper "I can't, I'm too excited"? - and does he really have to look that pleasantly surprised/ faux shocked when they do.

Grr.

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