Are you a summertime golf enthusiast, a woman with hot flashes, or just someone who enjoys comically conspicuous consumption? If so, you need to run out and purchase some Evian Mineral Water Spray straightaway. With every spritz of the five ounce, $10 bottle, you send the message: I have spent $10 on five ounces of water. Oh, wait; it's propelled by nitrogen. Well then. [via Adrants]
"PR News Channel." If you look closely, you can detect a contradiction in that name. But that didn't stop the launch of the new, highly craptastic site PRNewsChannel.tv, which aspires to be the "YouTube for Businesses." At the moment, it's more like the "YouTube for people who don't like to watch much at all." It will supposedly grow into a repository of video news releases; let's hope that it is driven into nonexistence by the sheer weight of its own inanity before that happens. After the jump, one of the few videos available on the site right now: "How to Take Konsyl Fiber Shake It!" It's oddly hypnotic.
What would you do if, out of the blue, you—a reporter—got a mysterious scrawled-on envelope in the mail one day with only a pair of panties in it? Probably be happy, if you're a man. But what if, the next day, you got an anonymous ransom note-style card with your picture on it, reading "I've got my eyes on you?" Load the gun and call the fucking police, that's what. But don't worry! It was all a PR stunt by some "branding agency" to get some media love! What. The. Hell? Bad move, to say the least. This is America, where reporters shoot first, ask questions later. [via Ad Age]
The great thing about the idea of "guerilla marketing" is that everything qualifies! Did you tell your friend a movie is good? Guerilla marketing. Put a sticker up? Guerilla marketing. Wear a certain kind of shoe? Total guerilla marketing. Now, it appears that the simple act of scrawling on posters on the street with a black marker qualifies as a sophisticated guerilla marketing campaign. The Black Lips probably paid thousands to an underground marketing firm so secret that you have to find its phone number written on the wall of the Alife bathroom to get this kind of street-level PR for their upcoming show. Or they just did it themselves when they were drunk one night. After the jump, photo evidence [via Copyranter] of this three-is-a-trend strategic marker-based promo campaign currently invading the streets of the East Village. (Ha, the "lips" thing is kinda clever though).
Heroic woman of dance Madonna has been working for almost a year on a documentary about the obscure African nation of Malawi, her pet cause ever since she adopted a son from the country in 2006. The Material Girl tells Interview magazine (in editor Ingrid Sischy's farewell issue) that, at the time, she "didn't know where Malawi was." That's what makes adoption logistics so difficult [NYP]! To further help the imperiled nation, Madonna teamed up with the good people at Gucci for an ostentatious luxury fundraiser that coincidentally also helped to promote the opening of Gucci's flagship store in NYC. And now it's clear that Gucci's commitment has not flagged—they're selling some items that will be very useful for Malawi-bound "jungle doctors":
"Our Mercedes-Benz advertising is positioned to fit noncomformists who scoff at 'status symbols' and reject flimflam appeals to snobbery." So wrote David Ogilvy, founding father of the classic ad agency Ogilvy & Mather, four decades ago. If you can figure that quote out, you will understand just about everything there is to know about the effect that advertising has on our minds. It's taken from a 1,900 word, 38-point treatise by Ogilvy called "How to create advertising that sells," which gives a punchy rundown of his personal knowledge as one of the premier ad men in America. But Ogilvy would not have been able to predict what he has wrought. It only takes three key points to tell the story of conventional wisdom gone awry.
If someone says to you, "Quick, name a modern-day equivalent of the exiled Jacobite Scottish noble Bonnie Prince Charlie," nobody would blame you for blurting out, "Jerry O'Connell, the B-actor who got his start in the 1986 coming-of-age tale Stand By Me." That's exactly what the people at Drambuie liqueur thought, too. So they signed up O'Connell, one of the five most famous actors to appear in Jerry Maguire, to add a little star power to the 2008 "Drambuie Pursuit Competition," which will have him racing across 100 miles of harsh terrain in the Scottish highlands, retracing the ancient steps of a fleeing Bonnie Prince Charlie—who legendarily held the secret Drambuie recipe, dummy! Hard to parse the intricate branding strategies in all this, but we think the message is: Jerry O'Connell is a drunk. Below, the choicest fabricated quotes from the press release, and a bonus clip of O'Connell's impression of Tom Cruise's Scientology video—one of his career highlights.
Happy news for fellas who just like to lay back with a cold one and soak up the rays: Stoner romantic comedy actor Matthew McConaughey is launching his own clothing line, called j.k. livin [Us]. The "j.k." stands for "just keep," and the "livin" stands for the recognition that stressing out over things like grammar can totally kill the leisurely pace at which life should be enjoyed. So far it looks like the line just features a half ass t-shirt, but hey, why worry? In a complementary move, McConaughey's girlfriend, Brazilian model Camila Alves, has launched her own line of astoundingly pricey handbags. Together, these items will bring the pleasures of Hollywood to you, the consumer. Photos of her $1,350 monstrosities, and her man's halfhearted t-shirt/ wristband set, after the jump.
Designer Jill Stuart may have had enough of Lindsay Lohan's slutty shenanigans! Stuart signed the persistently famous Lohan on as the face of her brand for a big ad campaign last year, but now she is reportedly looking at Hilary Swank as a "more professional image" for her next campaign [Mixed Media]. A double standard could be in effect; a lifetime of drug use and crazy behavior by Rolling Stone Keith Richards hasn't prevented him from being picked as the new face of Louis Vuitton. If a luxury brand wants a wild celebrity fronting it, shouldn't they at least pick an attractive one? After the jump, a visual comparison of Lohan's ads with Richards' ad. See if you can tell which has lived harder.
Supermodel Heidi Klum signed on to be the face (and ass) of Jordache last year. They needed the help; Jordache was really cool when I was in elementary school, and since then, not so much. The company has been pushing Klum's ads everywhere—today, there's a half page spot in the Post adjacent to Page Six. Which makes it all the more pressing to answer the question: What happened to her nipples? Jordache has chosen to offset the fact that Klum is doing topless ads by simply making her nipples disappear, which is eerie, bad for children's educations, and, frankly, un-American. Sports Illustrated does some photo magic for its swimsuit issue, but this is more blatant and disturbing. The offending ads are after the jump; please advise your kids that this is not natural.
Star magazine editor-at-large Julia Allison typically lavishes her marketing energy on a single product, herself. "How to make You the sexiest brand on the market," she recently explained to readers of Time Out. Last night, however, she lent her star power to another, lesser trademark. It was hard to tell whether yesterday's gathering at Paris Commune in the West Village was a celebration of Allison's 27th birthday, a photo shoot or a launch event for Pink vodka. Guests were asked to wear pink clothes; the cupcakes were pink; and Allison posed for photographs holding bottles of Pink. Every waking moment is a photo opportunity; and every photograph is an opportunity to build the brand of You, and Your alcohol sponsor! Now I admire Julia's shamelessness in lining up free liquor for a private party. But she didn't need to give her backers quite such a thorough commercial blowjob. And, though this may be unkind: there is something sad about a birthday party at which photographers, promoters and random party-hoppers, outnumbering the host's real friends, look awkwardly at each other when it's time to sing "Happy Birthday", too embarrassed to join in. (After the jump, a video by Nick McGlynn.)
In Brazil, they do things a little differently. There, it makes perfect sense that Coke Zero is promoting itself by paying for free tongue piercings for anyone willing to be photographed with a Coke Zero-branded tongue stud [Adrants]. It's strategic, you see—Brazilian strategic. Any presumption on your part that this is not the work of a sly marketing genius would be xenophobic. Below, some pictures of Brazilian Coke fans who chose to partake of the free piercings, and a bonus Portuguese Coke Zero ad featuring talking, walking tongues. Do not view while on acid.
Funny and sucky things happen when ads on websites get juxtaposed with content that the advertisers wouldn't like to have associated with their products. For example: Panasonic Toughbooks are super tough computers. One reviewer says they can take anything—"That includes being dropped from almost a metre, being showered with water, being thrown in the mud and being dragged through dust and sand. It's therefore no surprise that ToughBooks are used by the US military." So maybe appearing right next to these torture photos from Abu Ghraib on WIRED's site really was a good branding opportunity. Ehhh... some things just don't sell well. (Click to enlarge). [WIRED]
The issue of fancy men's underwear is still threatening to undermine this great country. Andrew Christian has unveiled his new, horrific men's underwear with Flashback Butt-Lifting and Contouring Technology. He promises that it "gives men the illusion of having a sought-after "bubble butt" without having to spend hours in the gym." Great John Wayne's ghost, is a bubble butt now sought-after among men?!? An actual quote from the designer, who is suspected by me to be working with the terrorists: "Surprisingly, I was actually inspired to create this technology while at the gym and seeing how hard men work on exercising their buttocks. I just knew that there had to be a way to achieve similar results by simply wearing underwear." Good. God. After the jump, before and after pictures of the new underwear technology at work. We beg you, do not be seduced.
More exciting news for the music industry: last year, 48% of all teenagers purchased zero CDs [LA Times]. That's up from 38% in 2006. Yes, more kids are buying music online, but not enough to make up for the drop in CD sales. And illegal downloads are also becoming more popular. The Times worries that "Going to the mall to buy music may no longer be a rite of passage for adolescents." So what are all the teens doing with their free time now that they aren't wandering through Sam Goody in search of the latest Christina Aguilera album? One word: Jenkem.
Yesterday almost every Starbucks in America closed for three hours in a widely publicized effort to retrain all the employees not to burn the damn coffee. No word yet on the status of the Olsen twins after the shutdown. The general consensus, which we agree with, is that this was as much a PR stunt as a retraining effort. And over at Starbucks Gossip, the definitive blog about the company (inexplicably run by King Of Journalism Jim Romenesko), the employee drones are doing their part by being INSANELY ENTHUSIASTIC about being dragged into work for three extra hours.
Last night at a club called Element, on Houston Street, a line formed in the rain. Everyone in line was on the list for a free Smirnoff-sponsored concert featuring Common, Q-Tip, and KRS-ONE. The fact that everyone was on the list made them that much more put off that the doors opened 45 minutes late. "I'm with Diageo," moaned one girl. "I don't do lines."
You probably suspected that advertising creatives included some bestiality fans. This ad campaign for the German magazine Deutsch [via Copyranter] could reinforce your suspicions. And the theme, it turns out, is not confined to the media space; sadly, it permeates advertising for consumer products, and even public service campaigns. Below, three examples of the indelicate use of animal love by the ad industry—the final one, the other half of Deutsch's two-page spread, is somewhat NSFW.
Here's a question from a PR agency that we just can't figure out: "Was New York socialite Tinsley Mortimer doing a little "file sharing" over the weekend?" WHAT? This is the lead to an email blast promoting some file sharing website in a very roundabout way. But we have to admit we're stumped by that opener. Why the scare quotes around "file sharing?" What are they really trying to say about Tinsley Mortimer? This is supposed to be making her look good, you crazy PR people! The more we think about it, the more dirty theories we come up with, which we will tastefully not print here. Some of you are pretty media savvy, though; what the hell does this mean? Full retarded yet cryptic email after the jump.
