Repeat offenders

The advertising strategy for Totino's Pizza Rolls is kind of weird, right? They're basically portrayed as a product that kids are totally obsessed with. Yet would such a product need to advertise? And assuming their claims to be true and bearing in mind that I saw the following ad appearing on the evening news just tonight, you kind of wonder why parents would be excited to buy their kids some snack food that isn't especially healthy and on which they have a disturbing fixation.



Who thought this was a good idea?

Girl 1: "There's nothing we love more than listening to our favorite songs!"
Girl 2: [overlapping] "There's nothing we love more than listening to our favorite songs!"
Girl 1: "But our favorite thing is eating Totino's Pizza Rolls!"
Girl 2: "But our favorite thing is eating Totino's Pizza Rolls!"

And then we get one line of the most wimpy-sounding version of "Kids in America" ever, just for good measure.

This commercial is conceptual crib death. The idea never had any chance of not being annoying - I'm guessing if you asked most parents of pre-teens they would tell you that trying to talk to a kid who has music blasting in her headphones is one of the most aggravating experiences on earth. So what does Totino's do? They try to sell you their product by recreating an impossibly obnoxious experience. As if that weren't enough, there's the awful repetition, which only points up the fact that neither of the girls is listening to anything going on around them. I suppose kids could find this funny, but if your target market is middle schoolers then you really need to be selling to their parents. And this ad just seems like parent kryptonite.

In this vein, here are some potential future ad concepts for Totino's:

* Kids in the back seat of a car tell us that they love violating each other's personal space and saying "I'm not touching you!" but that their favorite thing is eating Totino's Pizza Rolls.

* A four-year-old at the mall tells us how he loves to throw himself on the ground and scream if he doesn't get his way, but his favorite thing is eating Totino's Pizza Rolls.

* A 14-year-old girl halfway out her bedroom window tells us how she loves to sneak out late at night to meet her older boyfriend for some third-base action, but her favorite thing is eating Totino's Pizza Rolls.

* Through a telephone handset at the visitor's window, Lyle and Erik Menendez tell us that their favorite thing is eating Totino's Pizza Rolls.

I'm having trouble controlling THE VOLUME OF MY VOICE

Totino's Pizza Rolls: shitty after-school snack, or greatest food product ever invented? We'll let this panel of 12-year-olds be the judge.



Host Kid [whispering]: "You guys hungry? I'll make Totino's Pizza Rolls."
Loud Kid: "I LOVE TOTIN-"
Host Kid [clamping his hand over Loud Kid's mouth]: "But, we have to be quiet."

Let me first just say that I think it's nice they invited the retarded kid to their sleepover. Usually kids with development issues don't have a lot of friends, and I'm glad this group was inclusive, although really the host kid's mom probably forced him to do it. But this commercial shows why kids don't want the retarded kid hanging out with them.

Loud Kid: [takes a bite of roll] "I LOVE TOTINO'S!!!!"
[other kids start talking loudly, for some reason]

It's kind of hilarious how these adolescent boys all take these super-dainty bites of the pizza rolls, in spite of the fact that they're clearly bite-size snacks. Anyway. Obviously this loud kid is not supposed to be retarded. But with that in mind, what's his excuse? It's one thing if the taste of Totino's is so completely heavenly that he just can't stop himself from vocalizing his affection - although I call bullshit - but dude was yelling at the mere mention of the name. Maybe this is just how he reacts to everything.

Teacher: "All right, class, today we're going to learn about fractions."
Kid: "I LOVE FRACTIONS!!!!!"
Teacher: "...uh, all right, Jimmy. Anyway, open your books to page 240..."
Kid: "I LOVE PAGE 240!!!!!"
Teacher: "Settle down, Jimmy."
Kid: "I LOVE SETTLING DOWN!!!!!"
Teacher: "That's it! Report to the principal's office."
Kid: "I LOVE THE PRINCIPAL'S OFFICE!!!!!"

Bully: "Hey, nerd, give me your lunch money."
Kid: "I LOVE LUNCH MONEY!!!!!"
Bully: "Yeah, well that's a shame. Hand it over."
Kid: "I LOVE HANDING IT OVER!!!!!"
Bully: "Good, let's go, before you get your ass kicked."
Kid: "I LOVE GETTING MY ASS KICKED!!!!!"
Bully: "You asked for it!"
Kid: "I LOVE ASKING FO-"
[merciless pummeling]

The other thing I love/hate about this commercial is how the freezer has about 15 boxes of Totino's Pizza Rolls in it and almost nothing else. Does this kid even have parents? Maybe he wants his friends to be quiet not because they might wake his mom but because any raucous partying will surely draw the attention of the cops, and when they find a 12-year-old living in a house by himself, it will lead to a visit from Child Services, foster care, and no more sleepovers or Totino's Pizza Rolls, ever.