AdFreak: Red Tettemer

NeatDesk tames Abominable Paper Monster

He's got a balled-up takeout menu for a heart, business-card fangs and eyes as black as carbon paper. That could describe lots of folks. Tiger Woods, Ben Bernanke and Brian Morrissey come to mind. In fact, it's the Abominable Paper Monster, a jumbled mess of hard-copy documents and receipts, who gets "tamed" by the NeatDesk desktop scanner in the video posted below, by Red Tettemer. What's the worst that could happen, really, if you let a paper monster grow on your desk? You get really painful paper cuts or start a cubicle fire that burns the building to the ground. Either way, you've got an excuse to take a few days off work. Unless you work at home. Burn down your house, and your screwed. And yes, you readers under 25 are thinking, "WTF is paper?" Well, it's a long story.

—Posted by David Gianatasio

Published on December 4, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Filed under Gianatasio, NeatDesk, Red Tettemer

Red Tettemer makes war on its 'Frienemies'

You have to like Red Tettemer. Not only is the Philadelphia agency sticking with summer Fridays during these lean times, it's enforcing the tradition with obscenities, threats of violence and accusations of bestiality. If you're a "Frienemy" who works past 1 p.m. on Fridays this summer, these posters will remind you that 1) you're no better than a "shithead"; 2) you deserve "blows to the groin" ("Not good blows. Hard punches"); and 3) you're probably just staying late "to molest Woodbine," the agency cat. Do any other agencies even have summer Fridays anymore?

—Posted by Tim Nudd

Published on June 9, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (8)
Filed under Nudd, Red Tettemer

Pennsylvania ads are a long-form love story

Red Tettemer pulls out the stops for Pennsylvania Tourism in a high-concept Web series launching today with movie posters splashed around NYC and all manner of social-media tie-ins. The offering's called "Peter Arthur Stories." According to the press materials, it "tells the story of a 20-something young man at the crossroads of adulthood. We follow him follow his heart across Pennsylvania in search of his long-lost, pre-adolescent love, a waitress named Meg who served him the best piece of shoofly pie he ever had." It's a full 26 minutes long, broken into four episodes of six-plus minutes each. (That's the trailer above, and the first episode below.) The series looks charmingly quirky, but it's an investment. It might take less time to enjoy everything worth seeing in Philly! And what happened to the Weavers from last year's tourism pitch? Maybe they ate too much shoofly pie. UPDATE: Coincidentally, Red Tettemer has also unveiled a new tourism campaign for Philly. There are 55 different creative executions, all in the form of short love letters. Here's one addressed to powdered-wig lovers.

—Posted by David Gianatasio

Published on May 14, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (1)
Filed under Gianatasio, Red Tettemer, Tourism

Oh hey, it's another virtual world for tweens

Tween Brands Inc. and Philadelphia ad agency Red Tettemer have spewed forth yet another tween virtual world, just a few weeks after Disney XD burst onto the scene. This one's dying by design. ScapeNation is your standard build-an-avatar, play-games, win-points world, but with a twist: It's being destroyed by "The Darkness," and it's up to you to save it. When I signed up, ScapeNation assured me that I'll "want to play, like, all the time!" After a few games, I had earned 16 ScapeBucks, but when I went to buy stuff, I found out the merest T-shirt starts at 400! Which made me, like, not want to play at all. So, I spent the next hour thwarting the parental controls. You can't say "I am a banana!" or use the word "cake," but vajayjay, masturbation and nutsack somehow escaped the no-no list. ScapeNation is still a bit pretty limp in terms of content, too. Like Bella Sara, they have trading cards. Like Club Penguin, they're targeting both boys and girls. But if it's true that the players really can choose to save the world or let it die, then they've really got something different. Still, 400 ScapeBucks for a T-shirt in this economy?

—Posted by Rebecca Cullers

Published on March 3, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Filed under Cullers, Red Tettemer, Youth

Dating Red Tettemer people is always weird

For the second straight year, the Philadelphia agency Red Tettemer is trying to find Valentine's Day dates for its single employees via the Red Tettemer iMate. The shop posts pictures of its most fetching non-married staff members. You, acting at your own risk, e-mail them. It's that simple. The bio lines are brief and to the point. For the lovely lady above: "June Cleaver seeks Ward for her Beaver." For the dude below, who sports the second evil head: "Clearance. Two for the price of one." See last year's collection of great catches here.

—Posted by Tim Nudd

Published on February 4, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Filed under Nudd, Red Tettemer, Valentine's Day

Celebrate Feb. 2 with a plate of groundhog

Aw yeah, take a look at what’s about to claim a place alongside my coveted Alex Bogusky commemorative plate. This limited-edition homage to Pennsylvania's Groundhog & Shadow tourism campaign continues Red Tettemer’s impressive track record of bizarre promotional gimmicks—sausage foosball, cemetery toasters and topless staffers, just to name a few. If you weren’t one of the elite marketing bloggers to receive the groundhog plate, fear not. There’s one for sale on eBay. And judging from the fact that bidding was at $51 with eight days remaining on the auction, mine might be soon to follow.

—Posted by David Griner

Published on January 30, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (3)
Filed under Griner, Red Tettemer, Tourism

Will the groundhog live to Groundhog Day?

Red Tettemer's annual Groundhog Day-themed Pennsylvania tourism spots are getting more violent with each passing year. First, it was On The Road with Punxsutawney Phil. Then it was the lamest duel ever. And this year, the damn campaign starts off with Phil getting hit by a car. While he's recuperating in a dark, isolated hospital room over at Groundhog Dreams, we the public can turn his probability of survival into a hilarious game of chance! We can also interpret his concussion-induced delirium with the help of noted specialist Squirrelmund Freud. Should he live through this year's campaign, I'm anxious to see what'll happen to Phil next year. If the Red Tettemer guys get stumped, here's some free inspiration.

—Posted by David Kiefaber

Published on January 14, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (3)
Filed under Groundhog Day, Kiefaber, Red Tettemer, Tourism

Hatfield locks and loads giant hot-dog gun

If Hatfield Quality Meats and Philadelphia agency Red Tettemer have anything to do with it, we will have nuclear-powered hot-dog launchers available for between-inning use at baseball games in the near future. It's unclear how the nascent Obama administration will feel about Hatfield's "safe" nuclear program, but the U.S. government has passively condoned Hatfield and Red Tettemer's other encased-meats-based products, like this sausage foosball table. Hot-dog munitions have been blamed for escalating meat-on-meat violence in the Philadelphia area. We will keep you posted on developments in this fast moving hot-dog, er, story.

—Posted by Jeremy Greenfield

Published on November 19, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (4)
Filed under Greenfield, Hatfield Quality Meats, Red Tettemer

Foosball table livens up any marketing plan

Marketing materials simply don't get more manly than a foosball table with sausages for players. That's just what Red Tettemer has created with this "Sausage vs. Sausage" foosball table for client Hatfield Quality Meats. The PR missive explains: "Art directed by Todd Taylor and designed by Jaimi Steen, the foosball table will be used at live events and sponsorships. The ultimate goal of the foosball table is to add to the Hatfield brand experience at events and create a fun, engaging environment for consumers to familiarize themselves with the brand and the products themselves." A real sausage fest. Go meat!

—Posted by Tim Nudd

Published on September 9, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Filed under Hatfield Quality Meats, Non-traditional, Nudd, Red Tettemer

Philly's Red Tettemer is mad for 'Mad Men'

Philadelphia agency Red Tettemer won us over a few months back with their staffer's topless homage to Miley Cyrus. Now they've followed it up with what is arguably the industry’s best celebration of AMC's Mad Men. With just a few days left before the Season 2 premiere, the Tettemer team posed in true ’60s style for a limited-time version of their Web site. (We’ve posted a full screenshot here for posterity.) If you need even more of a Mad Men fix, check out this snazzy gallery of Season 2 promotional photos and the step-by-step evolution of the show’s new ad campaign.

—Posted by David Griner

Published on July 24, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Filed under Griner, Mad Men, Red Tettemer

Hiking Pennsylvania? Watch for Weavers.

Pennsylvania has "more paths than anywhere," which apparently makes it a car-free wonderland for synchronized zig-zagging cyclists. For its new TV spots promoting the state’s trail offerings, Philly agency Red Tettemer created the Weavers, a noticeably unathletic team of riders devoted to weaving across paths. That’s usually not an activity embraced by the sober, and it wouldn’t endear them to hikers. But it is a clever way to jazz up what could be a pretty dull tourism pitch. You can check out the 60-second TV spot, or get a full taste of “the world between your legs” in this five-minute mockumentary.

—Posted by David Griner

Published on July 10, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (1)
Filed under Griner, Red Tettemer, Tourism

Agency site offers up its homage to Miley

For all the talk of fancy-schmancy agency site redesigns lately, I'm far more impressed with this limited-time reskinning of RedTettemer.com. That’s Creative Media Strategist Rachel Timmerman posing à la Miley in the agency lobby. Philadelphia-based Red Tettemer occasionally switches up the look of its front page, and this week it appears they caught the Cyrus virus with a beautiful shot by photographer Chris Sembrot. I e-mailed Timmerman about the homage, and it sounds like she’s just yet another young starlet being steamrolled by an industry of sweet-talking jackals. “I was enjoying a private moment ideating when someone snapped this shot,” Timmerman said. “At first I was nervous and a little embarrassed — but now that I've seen it, I think it's really artsy, not...you know...skanky. If this proves controversial, I know my support team and my faith will help me through this journey.”

—Posted by David Griner

Published on May 15, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (7)
Filed under Griner, Red Tettemer

No shots fired in anger at Groundhog Duel

Up the punx! ... sutawney. Feb. 2 was the day of the annual epic showdown between Phil the groundhog and his shadow, and ad agency Red Tettemer and Pennsylvania’s tourism board documented it with Groundhog Duel. It’s quite an endearing look at one of our nation’s more ludicrous pastimes, and a slick Web site to boot. It’s just a shame that there wasn’t really, you know, a duel. Phil and his shadow rode to Punxsutawney on the same bus, did some weird mirroring routine that looked like the Hokie Pokie, and that was it—six more weeks of winter. Of course, they could have been conserving their energy for Feb. 5.

—Posted by David Kiefaber

Published on February 5, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Filed under Kiefaber, Red Tettemer, Tourism

PBS Sprout is back, but still without Melanie

It’s been a while since we’ve checked in with our good friends over at PBS KIDS Sprout (totally SFW). You remember, they’re the ones who had the brouhaha last year over Good Night Show host Melanie, who had appeared in a few possibly racy—but definitely stupid—online comedy videos and was fired. Well, they hired a look-alike replacement, and now they’re breaking a new campaign from Red Tettemer that shows kids and parents combining to use their imagination, joy and kindness. That’s all well and good, but when the first image on the screen after each cute “slice-of-life” story is Barney (i.e., evil incarnate) or Caillou (aka, the world’s biggest whiner), it loses a little something. This is anecdotal, but in my house, Sprout has totally dropped off the preferred channel list ever since Melanie left. And it’s not just because Dad’s in charge of the remote. (I wonder if the “Save Melanie” petition is still active.)

—Posted by Aaron Baar

Published on May 17, 2007 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Filed under PBS, Red Tettemer

Groundhog and his shadow have their day

A friend of AdFreak sent us a link to this site promoting Groundhog Day—or at least showing a cross-country trek in which the groundhog goes looking for his shadow. (The shadow apparently left because it doesn’t want to prolong winter.) We’re told that the aim of the site is to promote Pennsylvania tourism. Whatever the case, it’s well thought out, providing an entire filmed backstory about the groundhog and his shadow trying to make it back to Punxatawney in time for Feb. 2. Visitors can also sign up to get postcards from the groundhog, who seems to be having a journey worthy of Hunter S. Thompson, and send text messages and voicemail to “the hogs.” For extra ad-nerd enjoyment, click on “View the Journey” after the intro, then on “Boulder, Colorado,” and you’ll get the rundown on the duo’s unsuccessful attempts to raise funds for their trip by getting a job at Crispin Porter + Bogusky. (The pair are pictured here on the office’s security camera.) We’re told the site is the work of Philadelphia shop Red Tettemer.

—Posted by Catharine P. Taylor

Published on January 19, 2007 | Permalink | Comments (21) | TrackBack (1)
Filed under Red Tettemer, Tourism

A cemetery people are dying to get into

This campaign from Red Tettemer attempts to explain that there are “better ways” to get into Philadelphia’s historic Laurel Hill Cemetery than jamming forks in electrical outlets or hurling toasters into pools. Yet the agency does just that, according to its press release, “in hotspots around Philadelphia including hotels and restaurants.” Say you’re at one of those “hotspots,” and you’ve had a few too many, and you decide to emulate the ads with some nearby silverware? Or maybe your kids respond to the campaign by dunking a plugged-in appliance in Aunt Ida’s bubble-bath? Besides, if one of Philadelphia’s “hottest” tourist attractions is a cemetery, I think I’ll visit Pittsburgh.