We were on holiday in Umbria, and we were driving to a medieval, hilltop city called Cortona. So we put it into the SatNav and followed the directions.
The SatNav got us to Cortona okay, but I wasn’t sure about the route. It was taking us to the heart of the city.
The streets were getting narrower and narrower. Something didn’t seem right.
But the SatNav was the expert, and it said straight ahead. So we kept going.
Up tiny little ancient cobblestone tracks built centuries before cars. Still the SatNav said keep going.
The roads changed from streets to alleys. The alleys changed into narrow paths, I had to pull the wing mirrors in.
The SatNav said straight ahead. Eventually I stopped.
Cathy said, “Carry on, the TomTom says straight ahead.” I said, “Cath, that’s medieval steps in front. We can’t drive down that unless you want to do a remake of The Italian Job.”
And we had to carefully and slowly reverse all the way back. We went the wrong way because what I had done was to totally put my trust in an expert: the TomTom. And switch off my common sense.
That’s what we all do.
Steve Henry wrote the Holsten Pils campaign using the ‘Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid’ technique.
We wanted a young, alternative comedian to intercut with the old footage of dead film stars. As if they were both talking about Holsten Pils.
Steve had found a pretty-much unknown comedian that he thought was great. A Scottish guy called Robbie Coltrane.
So we shot the test films and Steve was right, he was great. The only problem was that Robbie Coltrane was fat. And all the experts know you don’t use fat people in beer ads. Because, if you do, people will work out beer makes you fat. And they won’t buy our beer.
But here’s an unusual thought. What if beer drinkers already know that beer makes you fat? What if it’s not a secret?
Every night they go to the pub and drink a lot of beer. With their friends. So they’re probably already fat. And the friends they drink a lot of beer with are probably fat too. And they don’t care. Because they’re having a good time.
The Pareto principle states that a minority of your consumers account for the majority of your sales. So it obviously makes sense to target these people.
This applies particularly to the beer market. We’re not selling beer to ladies who care about their figures. We’re selling it to blokes, who care about football and beer, and cars and beer, and page 3 birds and beer.
They’ve already confronted the inevitability of their beer-belly and decided to carry on drinking beer. So the job of the advertising isn’t to stop them finding out that beer isn’t a diet product.
The job of advertising isn’t even to get them to drink more beer. The job of the advertising is to let them drink beer if they want to. But get them to switch to our beer.
In which case a really funny, preferably unknown, comedian is what we’re looking for. The sort of bloke you’d like to go for a beer with. Robbie Coltrane in fact.
But the experts couldn’t be persuaded. They said you didn’t have fat people in beer advertising and that was that.
So we had to look for a slim, good-looking replacement. Eventually we compromised on Griff Rhys Jones instead.
He was well known, and he was better looking, but most importantly he was thin.
So no one would know that beer makes you fat. What would have happened if we'd used Robbie instead of Griff? Would we have sold more beer or less?
We'll never know.
Luckily we had experts to advise us. They're called experts because they've learned the rules.
And you never break the rules. No matter what common-sense says.
I love the signs that appear occasionally which say "Lorry drivers DO NOT follow Sat Nav."
Not only do they make you switch off your common sense, they actually slow down your learning of a route because you are simply following directrions not looking for it yourself.
If nobody broke the rules we'd still be rubbing sticks together to make fire.
Breaking rules moves thinking forwards.
TomTom once lead me to a carpark in Newbury - I switched it off and got a map book out.
I plan my own routes now.
The trouble is not all of us have enough experience of life to be heuristic.
"How can you be in adverting if you don't have a life?" - David Abbott
Dave, Years ago, when I was working in New Zealand, we hired Mel Smith and Griff Rhys-Jones to do an a cinema ad (we weren't allowed to advertise alcohol on TV) for Steinlager, for our client Lion Breweries. I don't know if you had the same issue as we had with Griff? He was comically brilliant of course, but completely tea-total! So we had to conjure up a non-alcoholic lager that looked like the clients award-winning brew - long before such a thing was
fashionable. It sold a lot beer though. Australia in the 80s and 90s had a very exciting ad scene. I know of one agency that came up with a concept that both they and the client absolutely loved. Then they tested the idea (groups etc) and it bombed. So, they researched it again with another focus group. Bombed again. The agency was distraught. The client was gutted. In the end, the client said F**k the research, let's do it anyway! It was a massive hit!
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Hi Dave,
I Googled directions recently to find a client and eneded up looking for a road that did not exist. A quick check on the map explained it. The Google map didnt make distinctions between underpasses and junctions.
They used a fat bloke in a TV commercial in Russia for Tolstak beer. It was very successful. He ended up with a lucrative career in Russian television. Mind you, I do seem to remember, all his mates were quite thin !
There was a colleague in the office not dissimilar to the one in the clip below. She was a real "geezerbird" she used to drink pints and play snooker. One night she even fell down the stairs in the pub, got up, ordered another pint asked for her cue back, and carried on as if nothing had happened. However, breaking the rules does raise some serious concerns in this clip.
www.youtube.com/watch
Dave
Talking of beer, 'The Woman Whisperer' is the best ad I've seen in a long time for beer. Great idea. Great script, direction, casting, editing, acting and lighting.
For some strange reason the ozzies seem to be the only ones left, to me, who have a healthy handle on sexism by meeting it up front with humour.
The U.K and America used to be this way inclined but now we seem to run scared. Ironically here in the U.K we are now mainly left with inverted sexism for a range of products. The only alcoholic brand that I can think of that goes down a 'sexist' route in the U.K is for 'Wkd'.
Going back to 'The Woman Whisperer', I agree with you Dave that it's all in the line "the woman whisperer", once you say that, guys in pubs everywhere will fill in the rest but should we be factoring in the opposition? Should we always get the women on board, even if the ad is primarily aimed at men and visa versa?
For instance would 'The Woman Whisperer' still work if she said, "Bugger off mate!" stormed out with man in tow with the end slogan "At least your mates can stay a bit longer"? Would that give both parties a sense that are in charge?
Men would swear they are one of the crowd and not the hen-picked one whilst women might drink that brand too as it shows them to be strong and dominant. Would it compromise the brand or would it open up the brand further?
For those of you not familiar with the ad please find the link here:
PS.
The Russian Ad I just posted originally had a car pulling-up outside the bar. They seem to have cut that off when lifted from you tube . (probably for legal reasons).
Hi John,
Check out this link to see what two different women thought about 'The Horse Whisperer'.
community.brandrepublic.com/.../it-s-a-joke.aspx
Spot on Dave. I guess I was trying to hedge my bets.
I wonder how audiences would have felt if they ran an antithesis of "The Horse whisperer" EG: Hubbie comes home, puts on a pinnie, does all the washing, hoovering, ironing, rewallpapers the house, and cleans the bathrooom toilet with her favourite bright pink rubber gloves.
Most women I know would quite happily tell their husband to
"Pxxxx off down the pub" , and most men I know would happily oblige.
Dave, Hi.
"For great beer follow the bear.' He was carrying a few extra pounds, but it didn't stop him selling industrial quantities of Hofmeister... A roly-poly model for beer drinkers if ever I espied one.
Am I wrong, or am I right?
Hey, Gotnoteef
I'm still rubbing two stick insects together. It works, but leaves a sticky residue on the fingers.
I'm forever telling my partner to stop looking at the map and read the road.
Hi Grilla,
Yup I agree.
And what about Peter Kaye in those John Smith's ads?
He didn't exactly turn people off, did it?
All drinkers care about is, would this make me and my mates laugh?
And does he seem like the kind of bloke I'd like to go for a pint with?
Is it a coincidence that many top comedians and comediennes are fat?
Is an evening better spent with a Fat Navvy than a Saturated Nav?
And will he be generous enough to buy me that pint, Dave. That's an important consideration for we Grilla's - no pockets in fur means can't carry money to pay for booze.
A lame excuse for not standing your round but I've used it a lot because it seems to work.
Guinness seems to have lost the way...
Dave Trott
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