In "A Gift from Mother Nature," a personified Aunt Flo stalks girls in the street and tries passing off a charming gift, suspiciously wrapped in red.
We like how, in the event of total brain density, a disclaimer at the beginning of the ad reads "YOUR MONTHLY GIFT FROM MOTHER NATURE IS A EUPHEMISM FOR YOUR PERIOD." It's like, thanks Tampax, we totally thought Flo was sharing her latest batch of fresh-baked Vegan cookies.
But the appropriately annoying human allegory doesn't just bestow The Curse with playful malice; she also encourages you to buy white dresses and makes tidy, embarrassing personal jokes in front of your boyfriends. It's hilarious when she chases a woman down the street, notices her pregnant belly and goes, "Shoot ... I forgot" -- and waves her away with obvious disappointment.
The video's objective is to show women how they can outsmart Mother Nature, which is the only weird thing about it: I'm not seeing any outsmarting, just a lot of wincing and running-away. Unless Tampax is suggesting we get knocked up at the next opportunity.
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This week in Los Angeles, El Pollo Loco will deluge ABC, CBS, FOX and NBC with a fresh wave of ads -- toting its $0.69 Taco al Carbon, among other cheap fare -- right around primetime.
Don't wince: the campaign's being called Family Stimulus Deals, and El Pollo Loco CEO Steve Carley is front and center. Ads are expectedly political in nature, the kind of work you'd expect to see from a Senate member-to-be, except they shill chicken instead of community roadwork. Funny thing is, for a spread so riddled with shticks the whole thing falls flat.
Sometimes using your CEO just doesn't cut it. And it's a bit late to riff off the Stimulus Plans circulating the Gov like so many pigeons.
See "Gracias," a dubbed Spanish ad, by Ideas; others, including English-language ones, are on the Official El Pollo Loco YouTube site.
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A great article by Wharton School Professor of Operations Eric Clemsons entitled "Why Advertising Is Failing On The Internet" takes a deep look at the current state (shambles) of advertising and what the future looks like after we all bid adieu to the industry's current lameness.
In a nutshell, and this is not a new line of thinking, it's all about people seeking information (because it's readily available) rather than having it shoved down their throats (as it has been since the dawn of advertising.)
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At a recent SXSWi panel conducted "core conversation-" style (in which a presumed thought leader guides a group discussion on the subject at hand), the hour spent sitting on the floor in a cramped meeting room proved one important fact about social media: Even the professed experts are doing it wrong.
A Dougie Howser-esque "social media specialist" at Razorfish and a group of others ranging in age from 17 to 32 years old sat cross-legged on the floor and cross-talked their way through a series of stereotypes, assumptions, and painfully incorrect conclusions.
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The intrepid and ever-present Jolie O'Dell discovers how Blurb allows designers, with or without design software expertise, to create stunning books of all shapes and sizes. Watch and learn.
By the way, Adrants publisher Steve Hall is involved with Blurb and Ammo Marketing on a project called Killed Ideas. We seek the best creative which, sadly, didn't get to see the light of day for various reasons.
If you've watched AgencySpy's Week in Advertising, you have to see Brokaw's O News. The similarities are, well, intentional, of course. Love the 'stache.
Here's a submission to Killed Ideas. For a college logo, designer Liz Oliner married the school's crewing history which dates back to the glory days of the 1920's.
Liz described what she envisioned when creating the logo, writing, "Women in long shift gowns watching the races on a summer day in Philadelphia. A quad pulls the perfect feather as it glides across the finish -- clean, smooth and controlled."
While the idea was killed because the school felt it focused too heavily on one aspect, there's no denying this logo has something to say.
If you have an idea a client killed or some spec work that hasn't seen the light of day, visit Killed Ideas and add your own.
This is the best. This is how brands should build loyalty. This is how flying should be.
We've all heard the mindlessly boring pre-flight announcements airline attendants make prior to taking off. All that crap about putting the tray up, placing the seat in the upright position, properly stowing your carry on, turning off electronic devices and all kinds of other stuff that just makes you want to fall asleep.
Not on Southwest. Not if you have David as a flight attendent. Check out how he welcomes passengers on his flights.
Recently someone mentioned Adrants had begun to ignore the sexier side of advertising. And she was right. It's been a bit puritanical around here for a while. But, on an advertiser-supported site, it's not like you can write about ad porn all day long without causing some concern among advertisers.
Though the fact remains, sex continues to be an integral element of advertising. With that, we give you this video promoting Daniel Power's Energy Wasting Day. Oh don't worry. It's not all that racy. No nudity. No gratuitous butt shots. Just a quirky 80's-ish style music video with a dude and four hot chicks. It's all pretty tame. Enjoy.
For those who have never attended, South by Southwest in an annual conference which focuses on interactive, film and music. For the purposes of the advertising industry, the interactive portion of the show offers a panalopy of insight. And that insight comes not just from the hundreds of panels but also from the people you meet (they are far more diverse than your typical ad conference attendee), the connections you make and the information you glean which is decidedly unavailable at most other industry events.
On a panel entitled, Behind the scenes with Mad Men on Twitter, three of the characters, Cari Bugbee (Peggy Olson), Helen Klein Ross (Betty Draper and Michael Bissell (Roger Sterling) opened up about their involvement in a seemingly well-organized effort to represent the characters of the AMC series Mad Men.
You can read the behind the scenes story here which we wrote about earlier but this gist is it wasn't sanctioned by AMC, AMC sent cease and desists (but later relented) and, to this day, the real world identity of some of the characters are still not known.
Ross encapsulated the effort well dubbing it "brand fiction" as opposed to fan fiction which she claims can greatly enhance and embellish the nuances of a "brand" and build a deeper loyalty.
On a Film panel entitled Case Study: Winnebago Man, the man, the legend, the most eloquent cuss word user Jack Rebney came out of hiding to comment on his new documentary film which is based on his famed 1989 Winnebago promotional video in which he pulls a stunningly eloquent Christian Bale.
On the panel, Rebney, now blind, spoke about the making of the film which documents his life, how the video affected his life as well as the dumbing down of America, the purpose of education ("teaching kids how to think. That's all it is."), off color political commentary ("pretty soon you're going to be eating fish heads and rice"), advice fans should approach his cabin in the woods (they better announce themselves "because if they didn't they'd get shot in the fucking head!"), people's misconceptions about his pit bull, Buddha, "the sweetest, kindest dog that ever lived" and his initial hesitations about working with a young filmmaker.
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