From a reader on Cadillac's product placement in Bad Boys II
Cadillac's been fiercely trying to regain their cool image and they just scored a particularly impressive coup in this attempt. Already beautifully highlighted in the Matrix Reloaded, the CTS makes its mark on Bad Boys 2 as well. The movie has a scene where Will Smith interrupts a car sales man about to take a client on a test drive of the Cadillac CTS. The client turns out to be Dan Marino (football player for the Miami Dolphins I believe). Will Smith promises to test the car thoroughly for him. He then takes off on a highway chase. As he puts the car through rigorous testing, he delivers his opinion to Martin Lawrence, "Dan Marino should definitely buy this car. Not this one but a model like this. He can't have this one though because I'm going to fuck this one up." Those might not be his exact words but they're a pretty close approximation. I doff my hat to whoever was responsible for this.
Product placements are common place but this is a perfect example of how we will begin to see branded products become key players within content.
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Recently, it seems the ad industry has gone all puritanical after the Miller Lite Catfight spots and successive imitators ended their runs. But, the industry being what it is, that little hiatus didn't last very long. In this week's Ad Age TV Spots of the Week, the sex and boobs are back. The sex is back with Beyonce waddling her big ol booty (and damn, it's definitely a nice one) in front of a drooling gas station attendant for Pepsi. And the boobs are back with a teenager cleaning her hands in a way that intrigues her date's parents as they com ein the house. Oh, and let's not forget the grand daddy of it all. Hugh Hefner and a couple of bunnies tell skater dude to get out of the pool in a spot for the X Games.
And the other spots this week? I never got to them. Too busy with Beyonce. You let me know how they are.
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Bob Garfield calls the Annika Sorenstam KFC television commercial the "latest egregious example of a clueless marketer chasing transitory celebrity without any thought whatsoever to relevance, of which Sorenstam's casting reflects almost none."
He doesn't stop there hoping KFC will see the light and position itself properly as "the perfect bucket of death-on-a-wishbone for a luscious, cardiovascularly incorrect food orgy"
Now that's my kind of ad review!
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Paris Hilton, New York celebutante, on Wal-Mart:
"I went to Wal-Mart for the first time. I always thought they sold wallpaper. I didn�t realize it has everything. You can get anything you want there for really, really cheap."
Welcome to the real world, Paris.
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A new magazine entitled Drill will launch its debut issue in October. The magazine is a Maxim-style men's magazine written for the military audience. If this story wasn't from the New York Times then I'd have to say this is a total spoof. It seems ridiculous. But then, military men are men too. Why should they be left out of the Maxim-ization of magazines. Of course, they could just go buy Maxim. Why do they need another?
"Drill will be a humor-oriented adventure title," said Editor in Chief Lance Gould, a former feature writer for The Daily News. "It is designed as a lifestyle magazine for people who serve in the military. You won't see a 'tank of the month' or a section on how to accessorize your rifle."
The magazine is published in Britain which raises some contention from the other military focused magazine, Leatherneck. Editor and Colonel Walter G. Ford says, "If somebody sent me a free copy, I might take a look at it. I don't see where it would be relevant. Why would I pick up a magazine owned by a British company and think that they know anything about the Corps?"
Let the battle of the leatherheads and Drill babes begin.
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You know a trend is done when the original trend gets spoofed by the big companies that started the trend. Heineken is doing this with their new "Rooftop" television spot that features three beer babes in an over the top salute the Miller Lite's Catfight and other beer babe spots.
Check out Heineken's other campaign called The Heineken Headline Hoax in which people can create their own headlined articles featuring their friends.
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At 1,873 pages, this tomb is certainly worthy of the term, encyclopedia. The book is the work of John McDonough and the Museum of broadcast Communications and Karen Egolf of Advertising Age.
According to the New York Times article, "It offers a history of advertising that takes its flaws, deceits and ideologies into account but also provides some insight into the institutions, agencies and corporations that have given it shape. Mr. McDonough argues in his introduction that within the last 150 years, for the first time in human history, it became widely possible to produce more than was demanded and to offer more than was needed. Advertising was a response to surplus."
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm surprised it doesn't come with a CD or DVD to give proper representation to the broadcast media as well and the Internet. Radio, in particular, always seems to get left out of any kind of advertising coverage. And that's no exception on Adrants either.
Still, this is one I'd like to own.
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GenX, GenY, YUPPIES, Hipsters, and LOHAS. There's a name for every demographic and phsychographic group out there. A relatively new one is LOHAS or Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability.
This group is comprised of people who value the importance of health combined with social and environmental values. These are people who buy organic food, energy efficient appliances, alternative medicine, and other products having to do with well being and preserving natural resources.
This New York Times article gives an over view of this approximately $230 billion market made up of 68 million Americans. Not a small market by any definition.
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