The 8 Wall Street Journal Ads Taking Aim at the New York Times
Ever since the Wall Street Journal debuted "Greater New York" on April 26 and sparked a good old newspaper war with the New York Times, media watchers have been giddily blogging and tweeting out photos of various ads the paper has been plastering all over town to promote its new metro section.
Click photo to enlarge
"Pun Intended," quipped the New York Observer when it stumbled upon the ad you see at top left, subsequently adding, "The Journal Appears to be Inching Away From Subtly" when it spotted a similar one suggesting that Greater New York is "ahead of the times."
Meanwhile, Felix Salmon and Jenny 8. Lee both had a yuck over the Journal's "Now Metro-sectional" promo. "Clever or trite?" Lee asked on her blog, while Salmon joked on TwitPic: "The WSJ's ad campaign hits the L train in Williamsburg, misfires catastrophically."
We wondered how many such slogans the Journal's marketing people have come up with and where exactly we could expect to find them.
A Wall Street Journal spokeswoman told us there are eight, and that they're being featured on Fox 5, NY1, rail stations, subway stations, billboards and newsstands around NYC, and news websites including ESPN, USA Today and Newsweek.
We pointed out the rather catty nature of the ads. "We're proud of Greater New York," said the spokeswoman.
We also asked for a comment from the New York Times, which has launched an ad campaign of its own.
"We are focused on high quality journalism and the brand campaign speaks for itself," a spokeswoman replied.
