Sadly, in the ad business, copycatting is all to prevalent. Sometimes it's unintentional. Sometimes it's just chance. Sometimes it's an agency "repurposing" old work for a new client. Sometimes it's the client asking a new agency to "repurpose" the work of another agency.
Whatever the case may be, it's always a sticky situation. We'd like to believe maliciousness is never in play. We can't really ever be sure though.
The latest case of copycatting comes from Work Labs, a company that prides itself for creating brands designed for the everyday worker. One of these products was Work Beer, a microbrew brand that was developed in 1999 and brewed for a short time by Main Street Beer Company. In 2005, Work Labs developed an ad campaign for the microbrew.
Yesterday, Work Labs Founder Cabell Harris contacted us (after it had been called to our attention by another source) to tell us his 2005 campaign for Work Beer looked strikingly similar to a 2012 New Belgium campaign for Shift Beer. You can see each campaign side by side here.
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Earlier this week, Run For Your Lives, an organization that hosts a "zombie infested 5K obstacle course race," placed an ad in the Wall Street Journal with the headline, We Will Bury You. The ad promised three people the chance to win a free funeral. Actually, the ad promises $5,000 which will be sent to the winners immediately. We guess it's up to them whether or not they set aside the money for funeral expenses or blow it all on a vacation.
The stunt is to promote the organization's races which occur in several locations over the course of the year.
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Well here's a first. An Australian Suziki Swift Sport ad was banned not because it showed some hot chick's sweaty cleavage but because...wait for it...it promoted "reckless or unsafe driving." Really? How...oddly logical.
The ad in question has a couple racing through a parking garage in the Suzuki. Apparently, the car is so hot, it causes the fire sprinklers to go off and, of course, allow for a gratuitous shot of sweaty boob cleavage.
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Oh the shitstorm we could incite with this one. Suffice to say, are we the only ones who are sick of certain people acting (stereotypically) like they are other certain people? Oh yea, this is America and anyone can be anyone they want. But sometimes, well, it just seems like some people are trying way to hard to be something they are not.
OK, send the hate mail now.
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When advertising archivists look back on 2012, the Year of Pinterest, they will undoubtedly wonder what all the fuss was about. After all, what kind of idiot spends their entire day trolling the internet to clip pictures of their most favorite things to see, do and buy? Oh wait. Sorry, ladies.
Anyway, Honda is the next brand to jump on the Pinterest pushcart.The automotive brand has, with help from agency RPA, debuted a campaign that asks the five most prolific pinners to...OMG...stop pinning for a day. Of course, in order to get the $500, they have to pin their asses off to created a Leap List. They then get to drive around in a Honda CR-V and do everything on their list.
The campaign, called Pintermission, has these five Pinterholics (this is so much fun) go nuts for 24 hours in a CR-V and then, much to the benefit of Honda, go back to obsessively pinning - hopefully about their experience with the Honda.
Let the insanity begin.
Check out the new iPhone Siri ads featuring Samuel L. Jackson and Zoey Deschanel. Jackson's is called Date Night and shows him preparing for the evening. Deschanel's is called Rainy Day and shows New Girl figuring out what she's going to do on a rainy day.
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OK what is it with these foreign ads that all look the same? The ads consist of a giant, provocative, beautifully photographed image with minimal copy and a logo in the lower right or left corner. Did they all go to the same ad school? Do they think their ads are so great they don't need to say much about the product?
This South Korean Cheil Worldwide-created ad for Oreos take the cake...uh...cookie when it comes to this style of ad. Of course, the ad is totally illogical. Who would feed a baby that small any kind of solid food? And just how is the baby going to dip that cookie into mommy's milk? Is she going to spray it on the cookie? Now we're getting into some kind of twisted porn scenario.
Yea, yea, yea. Advertising is all about allegory and analogy. But, really. Really?
UPDATE: As suspected, Kraft has confirmed the ad never ran. They did, however, say it was created for use in an advertising forum. Would that be Ads of the World? Where so many of these fake ads end up?
If this doesn't bring a little tear to your eye, you're not a parent. But that's OK. Because when you become one, you'll understand. There's really no way to explain until you, yourself, get there. Then, you'll understand.
Or you could watch this two minute P&G ad that touts the brand's sponsorship of the London 2012 Olympics and you can try to empathize.
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Over time we've grown to like T-Mobile Girl Carly Foulkes. Even to the point where we looked forward to seeing her prance about in her pink dresses in the latest T-Mobile ad. Not that she showed all kinds of skin or anything but because she had an attractive, feminine demeanor about her when she spoke to the benefits of T-Mobile's 4G awesomeness.
We're not so sure we're going to love her as much now that she's become the "bad girl" and, accordingly to T-Mobile's latest commercial, will be clad in black leather biker gear. We're sure (we hope) she'll still utter T-Mobile's messaging with the same girlishness but we're not so sure about her total transformation to "bad girl."
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If you are an agency or a brand that wants to be a part (or a bigger part) of the biggest advertising event of the year, Cannes, we can help you do just that. Over the past several years, we've always covered Cannes. The awards. The parties. And everything in between. Now we want you to be part of it.
Adrants will be at the center of the action during Cannes reporting daily on creative innovation, news announcements, what's discussed in the sessions, learnings from keynote presentations and, of course, the Lions winners. Get your agency or brand in front of the worldwide advertising community with this content marketing opportunity. Specifics include but are not limited to:
- Intro and outro sponsorship of Cannes-related coverage (website, newsletter, Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus) leading up to the event.
- Intro and outro sponsorship of each Cannes article (website, newsletter, Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus) we publish during the event (2-4 each day of the event).
- Intro and outro sponsorship of Cannes follow up stories (website, newsletter, Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus) after the event.
- Content sponsorship of event photography.
- A TBD number of banner impressions before, during and after Cannes if desired.
Email cannes@adrants.com for more details, pricing and to lock in your sponsorship now.
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