Muscle Milk pilgrim sexing up Thanksgiving
Considering how naughty Halloween has gotten, it was only a matter of time before someone took a crack at Thanksgiving. That someone is Muscle Milk, the athletic drink brand, which channels Justin Timberlake in this spoof hip-hop music video "Sexy Pilgrim" (posted below), courtesy of ad agency Pereira & O'Dell. It's fairly similar to the Smirnoff "Tea Partay" video from a couple years back. The clip is mildly entertaining, although I doubt many people will take Muscle Milk up on the download-the-song option at SexyPilgrim.com. (The coupon might do better.) Muscle Milk is pretty absent from the video, with the muscle-building properties of the protein drink implied via the buff versions of Miles Standish and Squanto.
|
|
Published on November 20, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (4)
|
Wait, ad-agency CEOs have stylists, too?
Perhaps I'm naive, but I always thought that only Hollywood celebrities had stylists. Not so. They're also helping those in the upper echelons of the agency world. Lisa Kline, the wardrobe consultant who gave Sarah Palin her controversial makeover before the Republican National Convention, also works for Deutsch North America CEO Linda Sawyer. In fact, in a profile of the Manhattan fashion consultant, Sawyer serves as a reference for Kline's yeoman's work. "She doesn't impose her style on you, and she just has a great eye," Sawyer tells The New York Times. Kline's other clients include "well-heeled corporate executives and television news personalities, including local and network anchors." —Posted by Brian Morrissey |
|
Published on November 19, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (4)
|
Never stop talking again, with Virgin Mobile!
Virgin Mobile's new ad campaign takes garrulousness to a new level. The commercial posted below shows a woman yammering into her phone while in a gym locker room. As she heads off to the shower, she leaves her mouth behind with the phone, where it keeps chattering away, as another woman has to listen to the indiscrete conversation about the first woman's disgusting medical condition. Two more ads show women in a store and poolside. The effect is less creepy, more reminiscent of bad Photoshop. Maybe that's what BBH New York is going for with the "Never Stop Talking" push, which promotes a $49.99 unlimited calling plan. There's also the obligatory social-media element, a Facebook contest launching next week to find "the sexiest mouth in America." —Posted by Brian Morrissey |
|
Published on November 18, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (9)
|
'Elect the Jury' is electing jury you expected
Everyone in advertising bemoans that it isn't as relevant in the culture anymore. The Clios used to be televised! Well, it turns out the industry is pretty insular itself. The grand "Elect the Jury" experiment to democratize and broaden the jury for the Andy Awards has come to a close. The jury will be announced this Friday, but take a look at the top 25 vote getters (sort the people by "Most Votes"), and try to find surprises. Mark Tutssel? Tony Granger? Bob Moore? Not exactly the standard bearers from whom you'd expect the cry of revolution. Shepard Fairey is the only judge not directly in the ad industry. Intriguing outsiders who did well in voting, like Obama speechwriter Jon Favreau and designer Marc Jacobs, said they weren't interested. Ben Malbon of BBH has made just this point: "Elect the Jury" is a nice experiment, but the results are fairly conventional. The jury is comprised of big agency executive creative directors, overwhelmingly American, with some favorite digital types sprinkled in for variety. At least the creatives can now stop begging for votes on social-media sites. —Posted by Brian Morrissey Previously on AdFreak: |
|
Published on November 16, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (0)
|
Drive someone nuts with Gap holiday cheer
The holiday season keeps moving up. We're already seeing the rollout of holiday "viral" campaigns. Gap is out with an early contender for most annoying with "Cheer Factory," courtesy of Crispin Porter + Bogusky. It features Gap-clad cheerleaders doing chants like "Good luck with that bird" and "You office party hardied." You can, of course, personalize the cheer for an unlucky friend. The cheerleaders will hold up letters in the friend's name. Recipients are sure to hold this against you for years to come. |
|
Published on November 12, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (16)
|
Wieden makes jewelry out of charts, graphs
Wieden + Kennedy in London is the latest agency to wander off into the product world. Its take is jewelry inspired by sexy graphs. The idea for the PLOT jewelry line came from planner Lisa Prince, who saw a certain beauty in a jagged line from a PowerPoint presentation. She teamed with art director Nicholla Longley and jewelry maker Hannah Havana to make a product line melding data with design. First up are a bunch of necklaces with artsy representations of commodity prices over the years. Wieden managing director Neil Christie says it's all about getting away from that pesky business of making ads. "We're always looking for the opportunity to work in new ways that are beyond traditional advertising channels," he writes on the shop's blog. The jury's still out on whether these agency forays into product making are more than a diversion to keep the staff happy and maybe squeeze out a Fast Company profile suggesting they're "reinventing the ad agency model." One agency guy gave me a simple explanation for the spate of agency product projects: "That's because the ad-agency biz blows." —Posted by Brian Morrissey |
|
Published on November 10, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (2)
|
Crowdsourcing leads to an ill-advised tattoo
Crowdsourcing is not everyone's cup of tea. Some find it a little insulting to advertising professionals who hone their craft only to see the unwashed masses debase themselves coming up with ideas for next to nothing. A new low may have been reached with a crowdsourcing logo contest run by Veer, a stock-photography brand owned by Corbis. Veer put a twist on its contest (the winner gets a Macbook Pro) by asking people to "re-create the Veer logo using real-world objects or materials." One eager beaver decided to use his arm and a tattoo needle. His submission is the video below. The best comment comes from the tattoo artist: "I ain't got to live with it." The fact that this dope is walking around with a stock-photography company's name on his arm alarms me. There's still time to top the tattoo, if anyone wants to literally get branded. The contest ends today. Thanks to @ijyoung. UPDATE: OK, it's a "faux" tattoo. |
|
Published on November 5, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (8)
|
Sorrell to Ad:Tech: You're lucky to have me
Martin Sorrell is apparently much in demand on the conference circuit. While speaking at Ad:Tech in New York on Wednesday morning, the WPP CEO reminded organizers not once but twice that they'd asked him for three years to appear before he agreed to grace the assembled digital nerds with his presence. Sorrell used the occasion to stroll Oprah style into the crowd at the Jacob Javits Center and basically regurgitate WPP's three-pronged strategy of focusing on emerging markets, digital media and consumer insights. A couple pieces of good news: The economy is "less worse," and WPP now finds Google a "much friendlier frenemy." A downer for the agency world came when Sorrell talked about industries dealing with "overcapacity" by shrinking their cost bases. That means more procurement torture sessions. "I have never known clients more focused on cost as they are now," Sorrell said, noting he's been in the business 33 years. —Posted by Brian Morrissey Previously on AdFreak: |
|
Published on November 4, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (1)
|
Latest book by Alex Bogusky gets roasted
Not everyone in the media is grooving on Alex Bogusky. The creative chief at Crispin Porter + Bogusky, who was likened to Our Lord just 18 months ago in Fast Company, has, along with now ex-colleague John Winsor, produced a load of tripe with his new book, Baked In: Creating Products and Businesses That Market Themselves. At least, that's according to a Los Angeles Times reviewer. Dan Neil performs a good old-fashioned evisceration of the book, shredding its premise as obvious, its tone as clichéd and arrogant and its conclusions as wrong, or at least impractical. Bogusky (who previously wrote The 9-Inch Diet, which advocated losing weight by eating off smaller plates) finds himself chuckling and giving a hat tip to the LAT for its use of "half-baked" in the headline of the Baked In review. Neil even looks down his nose at the book's literal thinness, noting it is a mere 150 pages of large type. Thank God he never got a hold of a Kevin Roberts book. —Posted by Brian Morrissey |
|
Published on November 3, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (10)
|
Donny Deutsch gives in, gets a BlackBerry
Until recently, it shouldn't have come as a surprise if Donny Deutsch was late responding to your e-mail. The talk-show host and chairman of the agency that bears his name was a staunch technophobe who shunned the BlackBerry, he told the CMO Executive Summit on Tuesday. But Deutsch recently gave in to the inevitable, after a pretty incredible streak of going without a smartphone. Deutsch admitted he's ambivalent about technology. As a self-described "late adopter," he feels "we're too connected as a society." That's an interesting take from someone in the communications business. But Deutsch is a Big Idea man. He told marketers not to get caught up in all the latest and greatest technology. The fundamentals of marketing, he said, are still about coming up with an "anthemic truth" and plugging in the rest. |
|
Published on November 3, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (1)
|
Digital shop enjoys slaughtering magazines
Carrot Creative, a digital shop in Brooklyn, is using Halloween to celebrate the media industry's woes. It posted this photo on Twitter, showing "digital" stabbing to death magazines like Domino, PC Magazine and Blender. Granted, I doubt we'll find many mourners for Cookie. I'm completely biased considering my job, but the glee with which digital people welcome the supposed demise of "traditional" media is perturbing. Yes, the industry is going through a wrenching transition and paying a heavy price for a business model that should have been transformed many years ago. That's meant lots of layoffs and even magazines and newspapers with storied histories shutting altogether. It's a sad picture. I'm not suggesting we hold a candlelight vigil for Condé Nast or get the government to bail out newspapers. Still, it can't hurt to keep the giddiness in check just a bit. |
|
Published on October 30, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (14)
|
DDB presents an 'asstounding' Reebok spot
Kudos to M&C Saatchi DDB Chicago for billing its new butt-centric Reebok spots as "asstounding." The shop doesn't monkey around with what it's after in promoting the EasyTone, a sneaker Reebok has targeted at the baby-got-back crowd for its leg- and caboose-toning capabilities. The spot above, called "Wandering Eye," stars a shapely spokeswoman who can't get the camera operator from coming in for close-ups of her backyard, although she seems quite flattered by it. The inspired tagline: "Better legs and a better butt with every step." Reebok is running the spots on broadcast and cable TV over the next four weeks, marking the brand's first major TV effort in two years. What a way to come back. UPDATE: DDB, not M&C Saatchi, did the creative here. M&C is the PR agency on the campaign. —Posted by Brian Morrissey Previously on AdFreak: |
|
Published on October 30, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (9)
|
Creators of anti-Droid ad unmasked (sort of)
It turns out pros are behind the Apple-fanboy spoof ad (above) of the Verizon Droid ad spoofing Apple ads. The Wall Street Journal's Digits blog has an interview with the creators, described as staffers from a "Boston-area ad agency." The creative director, "Shawn" (they declined to give their last names), doesn't go out of his way to refute the notion that creative directors can sometimes act like jerks. He says the most controversial line in the spot, "iDon't buy brands who bash other brands," is pointed out as being hypocritical within the ad itself (by showing a Mac and PC clip and the line, "i… oops"). "Apparently even in fake advertising, you can go wrong estimating the intelligence of your audience," Shawn says. Ouch. The question remains: Which Boston-area ad agency is it? —Posted by Brian Morrissey Previously on AdFreak: |
|
Published on October 29, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (5)
|
Use Bing, and get chomped on by a vampire
As I've noted in regard to infomercial spoofs, you can always leave it to advertisers to seize on a cultural trend, typically six months late, and beat it to death. Or in the case of vampires, suck all the blood out. No less than Microsoft, which has been called worse things than a bloodsucker by its rivals, is playing into this with the new Bing spot above. It shows the typical vampire type guy—greasy, long hair, severely manicured goatee—about to feast on an unsuspecting fawn after she uses Bing to find a place to eat that's suitably dark for his tastes. I'm actually surprised more advertisers haven't gone vampire for the Halloween season. —Posted by Brian Morrissey Previously on AdFreak: |
|
Published on October 28, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (1)
|
BBH staffer's Mrs. O blog, now in book form
Everyone in the ad industry loves stories where agencies do things for themselves rather than clients. The success of these projects can be debated. See Honeyshed. Now, BBH New York is celebrating the fruits of its labor with the release of Mrs. O: The Face of Fashion Democracy, a companion book to the Mrs. O blog that BBH account planner Mary Tomer started last fall to celebrate the style of Michelle Obama. The blog has remained popular. According to Quantcast, it gets about 27,000 visitors a month. Brain Pickings has an interview with Tomer. —Posted by Brian Morrissey |
|
Published on October 28, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (0)
|
Apple fan strikes back at Verizon Droid spot
It was inevitable. The Verizon Droid spoof of an Apple commercial (below) has now been spoofed by an Apple fanboy in the video above. It just changes the copy with jabs about ripping off Apple and the interesting claim that "iDon't buy from brands that bash other brands." This makes my head hurt. We can only hope a Droid supporter doesn't spoof the spoof of the spoof. A hole might open in the universe. Via the WSJ's Digits blog. —Posted by Brian Morrissey |
|
Published on October 27, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (6)
|
Isn't it time to retire the infomercial parody?There's no doubt that cheesy infomercials are quite funny. Look at the popularity of the Snuggie or the outpouring of interest following the demise of Billy Mays. But really, how many advertisers must go the tired route of running fake-infomercial spots? Fred Willard is getting a second career out of it. Microsoft rented him for the Bingathon that ran on Hulu, and then he did a similar act for FedEx, as seen above. Below are three other examples: Colgate channeled the Slap Chop for its Wisp toothpick thing. Subaru is picking up the conceit with its "Outback Detergent" ad, as is Bud Light with the "Tailgate approved" stuff. It might be time for a break. Why not spoof cheesy local TV spots? Start with the Carmel Car Service ladies. —Posted by Brian Morrissey |
|
Published on October 23, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (6)
|
Junket does a number on MediaVest staffer
Media buyers are used to being wined and dined. Rarely do they wind up with more than a raging hangover. One unnamed MediaVest staffer, however, apparently got more than he bargained for. He spent the weekend in Jamaica as part of Thrillist's JetMystery junket. All was going well until the Sunday-night party, when around 9 p.m. a huge strobe light crashed onto the dance floor and took out a half dozen people. (Obama Girl Amber Lee Ettinger escaped with minor cuts, according to the New York Post. A nation breathes a sigh of relief.) The ad guy got the worst of it, suffering a broken collarbone that required him to stay over an extra night. Thrillist CEO Ben Lerer called the incident "terrifying," but noted that uninjured partygoers were able to get over their trauma and still have an awesome time. Another silver lining: Lerer was able to work in a plug for sponsor Trojan into the Page Six writeup of the incident. —Posted by Brian Morrissey |
|
Published on October 22, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (0)
|
New Balance running in the wrong direction
As a runner, I'm regularly amused by advertisers' attempts to tap into the zeitgeist of an activity that can at times border on the masochistic. Now, New Balance is writing another sorry chapter in the history of running-shoe advertising. The brand's new spot has a guy running around with feet coming out of his forehead. You see, it's a crazy metaphor for runners thinking of their achy feet all the time, rather than losing themselves in the simple pleasures of a jog. An ER doc fixes things with a brand-new pair of New Balance shoes. This is pretty disappointing from New Balance and BBDO. Their previous "Love/Hate Anthem" nicely captured the complexity of an activity that's addictive yet features inevitable discomfort and the struggle against the understandable impulse to stay put. It would have been nicer to see New Balance take the production budget for the silly feet-on-forehead spot and pour it into "Chasing Kimbia," a Web documentary series the brand has sponsored that puts the spotlight on the often-anonymous lives of great Kenyan runners. That's stuff that will connect more with runners than obtuse metaphors. —Posted by Brian Morrissey |
|
Published on October 21, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (7)
|
No lie, Tony Stewart does love the Whopper
Today, Crispin Porter + Bogusky rolled out a 50-minute Web show for Burger King at TheTruthAboutTony.com. The brand promoted the show heavily during sports games over the past few weekends, saying it would prove once and for all that Nascar driver and BK endorser Tony Stewart really does love the Whopper. The setup mimicked the old TV show Lie Detector, with Stewart hooked up to a machine and asked questions. The site had a Digg-like system to collect questions from fans, who could vote them up or down. Stewart was deemed to be telling the truth when asked whether he's done a doughnut on public property (yes), whether he likes musical theater (no) and whether he's read a book in the last two years (nope). He was caught lying when he said he's never gone commando under the fire suit, cried after a movie of the week, had a special blanket or toy as a kid or checked out hot chicks during races. Burger King showed admirable restraint not making it all about burgers. There was a BK bag on the set and a logo on Stewart's shirt. Of the 30-odd questions, five came from the brand. The entire program led up to asking Stewart whether he really loves the Whopper. He does! All in all, it was pretty entertaining, even for someone who has never watched a Nascar race in his life, though it probably lasted a bit too long and at times seemed contrived. No doubt there's a novelty factor at play here with the live Web video, so I'd guess we'll see more. If you missed it, BK is replaying it tonight at 9 p.m. ET. —Posted by Brian Morrissey
Previously on AdFreak:
|
|
Published on October 20, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (11)
|
Bikes rescue lonely, isolated Ogilvy staffers
Ogilvy & Mather recently moved its New York offices from Worldwide Plaza on Eighth Avenue to the site of a former chocolate factory on the far west side of Manhattan, way over on Eleventh Avenue. For non-New Yorkers, let's just say Ogilvy is now in the hinterlands, closer to the Intrepid aircraft carrier than a subway stop. Grumbling, of course, ensued. So, what can Ogilvy do to keep employees peppy? Get them bikes. As part of a companywide effort to encourage bicycle use, the agency has purchased 50 commuter bikes for employees to borrow so they can pedal to that client meeting or find somewhere decent to eat. I guess the days of having the fleet of town cars at the ready are over. Welcome to the new reality. The shop hopes to build enthusiasm for the biking program a week from Tuesday with a citywide scavenger hunt, which naturally has a Twitter twist—teams must post photos to Twitter of each stop along the route. |
|
Published on October 19, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (8)
|
A proper goodbye to your media-agency job
The trick to having a viral hit is to tap into the zeitgeist. That helps explain why an agency staffer's double-middle-fingers resignation letter ricocheted around Twitter over the weekend, garnering more than a few knowing smiles from those in the trenches. The so-far-unnamed media planner, who worked at a shop in Chicago, skipped the usual farewell e-mail for this brutally honest top-10 list of the reasons he's leaving. My favorite: "When you guys were 'right-sizing instead of downsizing because of the economy,' you fired all the cool people." The resignation came with a link to the clip above. It's only a matter of time before the identity of this hero to the agency downtrodden emerges. —Posted by Brian Morrissey |
|
Published on October 19, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (3)
|
Sir Martin, your advertising machine is here
WPP Group CEO Martin Sorrell's commitment to creative has frequently been questioned. He made fun of his reputation himself in Cannes a few years back by jokingly wishing there were a machine that could take care of the creative process without the pesky creatives. Hope is on the way. The Ad-o-matic is an all-in-one ad generator sure to appeal to smart, penny-pinching CMOs. It was created by Miami Ad School students who are clearly set to enter the business with jaundiced eyes. —Posted by Brian Morrissey |
|
Published on October 19, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (2)
|
Amp isn't the only brand on a quest to score
Of the many complaints that rained down on Amp Energy's "Amp Up Before You Score" iPhone app, a couple of common ones involved the notion of "scoring" with women and the creation of crude female stereotypes. It's sexist, many claim. But it's not like the PepsiCo brand is the only marketer using this rather common expression. Take Spectrum Brands' Remington shaver. It has kicked off a promotion to win a crazy weekend in Las Vegas. The effort includes an online game called the "Face of Success Challenge," which asks: "Think you can master the perfect look and slickest moves to score big with these lovely ladies?" The game then asks you to select from among, yes, five female archetypes: fitness instructor, retail consultant, paralegal, pharma sales rep and waitress/actress. Players choose pickup lines to test their success with the ladies. Will it meet with the same outrage? My guess is no, if only because "Spectrum Brands" isn't exactly "Pepsi" when it comes to name recognition. —Posted by Brian Morrissey Previously on AdFreak: |
|
Published on October 16, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (2)
|
Media buyers urged to gun down sales reps
Life as a media buyer isn't just strip clubs and steak dinners on the dime of publishers. It's also about a torrent of ad-sales people with really nice teeth and expensive shoes bugging you 24/7 to close a deal. That means far too many pestering phone calls and e-mails, along with vapid presentations and the same idiotic questions. Games publisher Intergi hopes to curry some favor with the media-buyer world with a casual game called Media Buyer's Revenge, which invites you to play the role of a deranged media buyer who guns down sales reps when they pop up with questions like, "What kind of CPM are you looking for?" and "What click rate do you think is good?" |
|
Published on October 15, 2009 | Permalink
| Comments (2)
|
