Hoosiers gird for time-shift-induced societal meltdown

Our friends in Indiana are bracing for chaos this weekend. The Final Four? Piece of cake. No, the normally placid Hoosiers are faced with something more dire: daylight saving time. For the rest of us, this is a normal, once-a-year hassle that, at most, cuts out an hour of sleep and makes us late for brunch. For Indiana, this whole spring-forward, fall-back thing is terra incognita. The state somehow opted out of the whole DST thing 30 some years ago, choosing instead to just keep its clocks as they are, sometimes being in step with East Coast time and other times with Central. This year, most of Indiana’s counties will switch along with Eastern Time. This is not turning out to be a simple matter in the Heartland. A few rogue counties vowed not to comply, and the state is preparing for computer glitches. It’s Y2K part two, Indiana-style. What’s more, Indy bar owners complained they’ll lose out because Final Four visitors will have an hour less of hard-core early-morning booze time. Gov. Mitch Daniels stepped in and unilaterally allowed bars to operate in a parallel universe, where daylight saving time starts at 3 a.m. and doesn’t affect last call. Quite a place. Stay calm, Hoosiers, you’ll get through this.

—Posted by Brian Morrissey

Published on March 31, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (2)
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‘The Office’ PSA spoofs dole out real-world advice

As a child of the ’80s, I credit PSAs in part for my successful navigation through a very dangerous world. Thanks to Nancy Reagan, who told me to “Just say no,” Gary Coleman, who instructed me to “Stop, drop and roll,” and G.I. Joe, who reminded me that “Knowing is half the battle,” I’m not a crack addict, I’m not on fire, and I’ve never been abducted by Cobra Commander. So when NBC last night demanded my attention with its trademark “The More You Know” melody, I sat up straight and waited for my next life lesson. Sayeth Ryan from The Office: “You might be out with your friends on the weekend in a cool part of town when someone offers you a beer for $9. Don’t do it. $9 is way too much to pay for a beer. Just walk away.” Another gives advice on how to handle office romances, and a third, from Kelly, offers the following makeup tip: "If you use two shades of lipstick, it can even look cuter." OK, so it's an April Fool’s spoof series, but it's still valuable advice.

—Posted by Deanna Zammit

Published on March 31, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (3)

Was TV the key to baby boomer greatness?

For all of you who think AdFreak is obsessed only with Marian Salzman, here’s a note about another high-profile ad lady, Linda Kaplan Thaler. Kaplan Thaler yesterday brought to the attention of tanned, taut-beyond-their-years Angelenos that perhaps the “Greater Generation,” aka baby boomers, are not as great as they've been led to believe, via this op-ed in the L.A. Times. In fact, maybe the primary reason boomers think they’re so great is that they were the first to have their every milestone broadcast on national TV, spawning a generation of navel-gazing hula-hoopers. And advertising played no small role. Now, they're enjoying self-important Ameriprise ads with lines crediting them for “giving new meaning to the meaningful relationship,” but overlooking the one-in-two divorce rate. My favorite line: “By the way, when did we all start having restless leg syndrome? Must have happened from sitting too long watching ourselves age on the tube.”

—Posted by Deanna Zammit

Published on March 31, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (3)

Trump follows Branson into home loans biz, but not—that we know of—hot tub

Weird. Just as we reported yesterday that Richard Branson was launching a home loans business, we just received an invite to the launch of Trump Mortgage LLC next Wednesday at (natch) Trump Tower. Makes us wonder, if having gotten soundly beaten by the Donald on the reality show front—when he tried an Apprentice-like show—Branson just wanted to beat him into the mortgage market. No word on whether, like Branson, the Donald's mortgage advertising will include him in a hot tub with two young lovelies, though, as we speculated yesterday, we wouldn't find it completely out of the question. On the other hand, this venture seems to be a family affair, with both Don Trump Jr. and Ivanka included on the invite. Apparently, the new little Trumplet will not be in attendance.

—Posted by Catharine P. Taylor

Credit: NBC

Published on March 31, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (1)

U.K. football fans are bloody animals

The World Cup is coming, and at least one U.K. advertiser is being blatantly honest about this: English football fans are animals. Check out this energetic TV spot for Sure Sport for Men showing a city overrun with wild beasts, all hyped up into a frenzy about football, about to tear one another limb from limb. (The ad was created by Lowe London, and directed by Noam Murro. The tagline is, “Extreme protection that lets you go wild.”) As part of its larger campaign, Sure Sport for Men is also looking for the U.K.’s wildest football fan, which should be a fun task. (Just look for the empty bottles of Tesco’s vodka at his feet.) Hooligan culture has been a blight on England for eons—a “hideous excrescence on our civilization,” as the Times of London once put it. Now, it seems, it might even be something to celebrate.

—Posted by Tim Nudd

Published on March 31, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (0)

In-sleep advertising: reaching a truly passive audience

In what would have to be an April Fool’s joke, eMarketer has posted a story about marketers such as Coke, Nike and Speedo exploring “in-sleep advertising,” which uses a cochlear implant to deliver ads during slumber. (But good for them for not disclosing it's a joke at any point ... unless—yikes—it's real.) The story explains: “The beauty of the technology is that the cochlear implant communicates wirelessly with the ad server connected to the Internet so new ads can be tailored to each subject and delivered at each REM phase.” It even predicts that in-sleep advertising will be a $3.3 billion market by 2010. Maybe there’s a marketing opportunity here for Ambien? UPDATE: AdJab has reported this story without even a hint of skepticism. Is it possible they're not in on the joke?

—Posted by Catharine P. Taylor

Published on March 31, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (3)

Universal picks 25-year-old’s ‘Slither’ ad

A month ago, Universal Pictures challenged movie fans to create their own TV commercials for Slither, its upcoming slug-centric horror film. The results are in, and a 25-year-old Southern Californian named Chris Ell has won the contest with a spot titled “Chick Flick Payback.” “Remember the last movie she made you see?” says on-screen copy, as a romantic scene begins—then cuts off. “It’s payback time.” Then we get the Slither scenes, showing little red slugs crawling all over everything and a monster with a serious side-bite problem. It’s pretty amusing, although if this movie’s main selling point is that it’s not a romantic comedy, it may be in trouble. The spot aired nationally last night during NBC’s My Name Is Earl, and Ell won $25,000 for his efforts. Thanks to Movie Marketing Madness for the link.

—Posted by Tim Nudd

Published on March 31, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (1)

When notorious supermodels attack ...

Time to scratch Naomi Campbell from the list of candidates for a phone-company endorsement deal.

—Posted by Mark Dolliver

Published on March 30, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (3)

‘Snakes on a Plane’ bound for box-office gold?

Who needs advertising when you’ve got a really dumb title for your movie? Snakes on a Plane is still five months from takeoff but has already been declared the “worst film of 2006” by Wired magazine, according to a Wikipedia entry, anyway. Think that will hurt its opening-weekend box office? Not a chance. As the hot topic in online movie circles, Snakes (or SOAP) is inspiring the blogosphere to create freelance movie trailers, posters and story lines. In online vernacular, it’s one of the hotest memes since The Blair Witch Project. Star Samuel L. Jackson, who threatened to quit when someone proposed changing the name of the movie to Pacific Air Flight 121, signed up for the project based on the name alone. For the posters to come, may we suggest this headline: “You’ve read the title. Why see the movie?”

—Posted by Richard Williamson

Credit: James Dittiger/New Line Productions

Published on March 30, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (4)

Hooters Air clips its wings

It seems that after three years of flying the very friendly skies, Hooters Air is about to undergo a bit of a surgical reduction. That is, it’s grounding regular passenger service in favor of charter flights for sports and tour groups, its original business model. Founder Bob Brooks said it’s the industry, and not his business model, that’s “a terrible mess.” Although, when you market yourself to chicken-wing eating, boobie-drooling Bubbas who want nothing more from an airline than inspiration for flotation device jokes, you’re not exactly going to grab the four-seat-per-purchase family crowd. Niche marketing does have its drawbacks.

—Posted by Deanna Zammit

Published on March 30, 2006 | Permalink | Comments (2)