“I should be so lucky. Lucky, lucky, lucky”. Kylie Minogue sang of her desire in the 80’s when looking for love and somebody somewhere at Fire Multicom (ad agency) must be doing breast strokes in a pool full of chlorinated luck. With rabbits foot water-wings.

I’d almost be apologetic selling this pitch to the Barth hierarchy and even more red-faced when they gave me the green light for the projected campaign.

In advertising it is sometimes the failure on the part of the consumer to identify the difference between a simple idea and a lazy idea. As for this series of charmed images… well it seems apt that we borrow the principal theme and let fate decide on the toss of a shiney coin. Simplistic or lethargic? Afterall, I may not be so fortunate to wear the moniker of a ‘Lucky Girl’ but I would still like to know what part fate has to play in terms of what this confused boy may conclude.

To be honest, there is no need for the flip of a dollar coin. It is indicative that the client brief was to make the consumer feel somewhat elevated in their purchase of any Barth product. What better way to visualise someone’s good fortune than to associate it with traditional symbols of luck. (The large brown hand for that matter is actually a Brazilian Figa: a clenched-fist good luck charm)

But that for me is where it appears to be born of lethargic origins. From the outset we can categorize this as a simple 1 + 1 formula. Take product in question & insert appropriate descriptive. If this was a campaign of misfortune then we would fully expect to see the model clambering over a skull and cross bones, to be guilty of smashing a mirror with the heel of her shoe or perhaps even an image of someone stepping over 13 gravestones (but don’t her shoes just look divine?!)

They say we make our own luck in life.

If you can’t find the time yourself then just give someone a call at Fire Multicom and they’ll come rushing around with a box full of it.

Advertising Agency: Fire Multicom, São Leopoldo, Brazil
Creative Director / Copywriter: Fernando Rosa
Art Director: Pedro Balsemão
Illustrator: Bandits Graphics
Photographer: Marcelo Nunes, Bandits

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Introducing Cavalieri Clothing Company’s Cava Couture collection!

We’ve started off with an alliteration so please allow me to indulge in one myself – what would women want with weak whispers?

You’ve got to give the advertising agency a little bit of credit for their innovative design for the snappy attempts to promote gossip and underwear amongst our fairer sisters of the world. On a limited budget they’ve concocted a potential talking point in the advertising world but for all the wrong reasons I’m afraid.

I have no experience of the atmosphere within a ladies toilet – that I can guarantee you! But if you press your thirsty ear against the rumour mill they would have us all believe that women like to pass on stories about possible situations that may arise, could perhaps have occured or most certainly definitely might happen. The truth is we’re all a little more delicate in our ways of gathering information and using it for the appropriate occasion. This quite simply is not one of the topics you would feel like stopping traffic over.

To put myself in the position of a female looking to lay the agonising egg of a full bladder of wine, the last thing I’d be paying particular attention to was the cut of the girls knickers in the cubicle next to mine. I’d be even less inclined to care what brand they were and why my porcelain placed neighbour is repeatedly broadcasting herself like she’s just discovered a cure for cancer within the bottom clenching retro prints.

In theory, it’s a wee spoonful of ‘out-the-box’ creative medicine in an industry that is sometimes devoid of adding extra dimensions to placcid advertising campaigns. However, in reality it’s a marketing ploy taking up the valuable place of a needy woman who cannot wait to get back to her table of friends gossiping about Mark and Linda from the IT department.

Advertising Agency: Santy, Phoenix, USA
Creative Director: Adam Pierno
Art Director: Chris Cavalieri
Copywriter: Jamie dos Santos
Photographer: lee b.

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At first when I saw these ads, I thought that Greenpeace had just taken cute pictures of stuffed animals and crammed a slogan in underneath it. However, when I read the small print above the man slogan, which says “You and your children can get used to this, but you don’t have to” I felt like I was really missing something. Then right away I saw that the bunny had four ears and the elephant had two trunks.

It’s like the Chrysalids meets Winnie the Pooh.

The whole campaign actually really impressed me. It’s like looking at a picture that was taken in someone’s living room, maybe 100 years in the future. Between now and then this is what I picture as having happened: There has been some sort of nuclear disaster, mutations have occurred, we have tried and failed to deal with the problem and finally, accepted our new creations for These are the only animals that the children of that generation will grow up knowing.

The ads could be a setting for a sweet sci-fi movie. Although, if it was a sci-fi movie, it would be people instead of animals, and they would all be kept hidden away in underground cities. Then, one day, they would all break out and, under the command of a new blood thirsty leader, extract revenge on their captors.

The ads are, visually, very appealing. They’re warmly lit, the colours all go together really well, and maybe it’s just because the pictures are of stuffed animals but I feel cozy just looking at them.

Thanks for these ads Greenpeace, I’m going to go write a sci-fi epic.

“Get BACK in your cage, Snake-Boy!”

Advertising Agency: Scala JWT Bucharest, Romania
Executive Creative Director: Mihai Cojocaru
Creative Catalyst: Angela Teodorescu
Art Director: Virgiliu Andone
Photographers: Andrei Orcula, Virgiliu Andone
Copywriter: Andreea Dragomir

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Wow, they certainly know how to appeal to women these days, don’t they?

Or maybe not.

I have never seen an ad for female products that manages to be both interesting and tasteful: they are either boring and a waste of time, or they are revolting. This one is no exception.  It certinly isn’t boring, and I suppose it has to be said that it is different and imaginative, however it is most certainly revolting.

What amazes me is that someone actually came up with this idea, and whoever it was actually had the balls (or lack thereof) to pitch such a stupid idea. And one can only assume that the people at Johnson and Johnson really wanted something different this time; the pressure was on. Another assumption I make is that not many people came to the office at Lowe Group by deadline day with any decent innovations on advertising feminine hygeine products; can you imagine how bad the others must have been if the idea for a vampire man with tampons for teeth was accepted as the most impressive?

I thought that ads for feminine hygeine products couldn’t get any worse after that abomination of an advertising campaign by Kotex featuring the beaver. That was wrong in too many ways to imagine, but at least it had a sense of humour (albeit a pretty stupid one).

It is clear that the advetisers are trying to talk about the reason for a tampon without actually talking about the reason for a tampon (because nobody likes talking about the reason for a tampon).

What they do instead is take our imaginations to places they do not want to go. Something tells me that, with or without nasty advertising, women are always going to buy the product anyway.

Advertised brand: o.b. Tampons

Advertising Agency (Name, City, Country): Draftfcb/Lowe Group, Zurich, Switzerland
Agency website: www.lowe.ch
Executive Creative Director: Daniel Comte
Art Director: Sebastian Hugelshofer
Copywriter: Ivan Madeo
Photographer: Sandro Diener
3D-Art: Pixelprinz.ch
Graphics: Claudia Gaisser

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I’m ashamed to say it, but it took a long time for me to get these ads. I stared at the pictures for a while trying to figure where the ‘clever’ in these ads was hiding. I was very excited when I found it and had a great ‘AHHHH!!’ moment.

Aren’t they cool?

Firstly the photography is AMAZING! These are the pictures that I wished I took. Once again it falls into the questioning of this popular presence of, what I call, ‘dark photography’ and if you’re following entries by me (Sonia) particularly then you’ll know what I’m talking about. Advertisers seem to be choosing darker frames rather than bright shiny ones. I don’t know if its just the contrast/brightness on my screen, or my eyes, or even worse, just all in my head but it seems to be a rising trend. And it works.

Okay, admittedly in the first two stills the picture is meant to be dark to emphasize the creepiness of the basement and the darkness beside the firelight, but the last frame could have been bright, he’s in a park for goodness sakes! Maybe the graphic designer was just following a trend.

I’m also not quite sure why it works. Maybe because darkness arouses romanticism and the unknown, desire and yearning for what it is Other. Or maybe because it just looks cool.

Anyway, I think it’s clever and it looks cool. And I wish I could see the world in sound and maybe also that I had more time to sit in a park and feed pigeons.

Advertising Agency: Saint Bernadine Mission Communications Inc.
Creative Directors: Andrew Samuel, David Walker
Art Director: Jennifer Hicks
Photographer: Noel Hendrickson
Retouching & Production: Jack Griffin, Inc.
Published: March 2009

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Oh this picture is so very disturbing. I don’t think I’ll be able to look at a roast chicken in the same way ever again. Maybe it’s the fact that the chicken is standing up, or that it looks a little more human but still delicious in its roasted goodness, or that I just came back from a holiday on the Sunshine Coast and this chicken is a similar colour and build to a lot of the men walking around on that beach. I don’t know. But I do know that this is disturbing. The salad looks good though.

Once again, disturbing. This fish has eyes! (Or at least eye). And lips! Pouty Angelina Jolie lips- you know the kind of lips that don’t look like they should be kissing adopted kids goodnight. Oh gross. This is why I only eat my fish filleted and crumbed or battered. Blargh!

The tagline that takes the title of this post is a result of my trusting in the source of this advertisement. I don’t speak any French (although three years of high school says that maybe I should, a little). But I really don’t feel like this food is looking any prettier and I’m too disturbed by images of roasted, half-naked beach bums and Angelina Fish-lips to consider the flavour value of the sauce.

Although I must ask, why women? Why is it that there are always women in the domestic advertisements? Why are laundry, meal preparations, bathroom cleaning and every other household task mostly completed by women? Despite the fact that most of the celebrity chefs I can think of are men. It annoys me.

Advertising Agency: Publicidad Augusto Elías, México
Creative Directors: Ricardo Curiel, Lluís Monsó
Art Director: Luis Monsó
Copywriters: Ricardo Curiel, Valeria Rojas
Illustrator: Wow Digital
Photographer: David Eisenberg
Published: January 2009

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You are what you take

I think this advertisement is great. At first, I wondered who spent all that time sculpting straws into the image of a person’s face, and then my brain actually started working, and I realised that probably someone just pushed their face into a bunch of straws to make the shape. It reminds me of those fun pin-art toys I used to have as a kid, where I would sculpt my hands, feet, face, and as many toys as I could fit between the small metal frame. I really like this sort of thing, it is very simple yet has the look of something far more complex. It is always interesting to see an image that is not, on second glance, what it first appeared. I like it, because it is nice to look at.

However, the tagline just doesn’t work for me. It may be that in the process of translation from Spanish to English the message loses it’s meaning and effectiveness, but I think that the phrase “You are what you take” makes little sense in this context. As far as I can see (and my understanding may be confused), the person has been drinking so much tea, they have become a straw-face. Sounds pretty stupid, and if anyone can get a better understanding feel free to share it. My understanding makes no sense: if you are what you take, wouldn’t the person be turning into iced tea?

Anyway, seeing as my perception of this advertisement was a little shady from the beginning (sculpting straws?), I can certainly accept that I have got it all wrong and admit that maybe I just don’t get it. After all, it is Monday morning.

Maybe I need a nice, cold drink to refresh and invigorate my imagination…

Advertiser: Nestle
Agency: Publicis Venezuela
Creative: Demian Campos, Jose bajares, Manuel Fleitas, Prato Maru.
Creative director: Douglas Rios, Eduardo Capuano, Demian Campos
Attendance: Dougmary Esquirajosa
Planning: Julio Grande

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