Forget smartphones, get a smarmphone

Leave it to Apple to concoct the smarmiest, most defensive ad campaign of the year.



Smug Douchebag Announcer: "If you don't have an iPhone, you don't have iBooks. So you don't have your favorite books in your pocket."

The emphasis on "your" there is weird, like if you buy an Android Phone it jams a hundred books you don't like down your pants. "Hey! Get out of there, the complete Dean Koontz oeuvre!"

SDA: "And you don't have the iBook store, an entire bookstore in your pocket."

Just in case you couldn't figure out what "the iBook store" could possibly be referring to, here's another whole clause!

SDA: "So whether you're looking for a certain author or a New York Times best-seller, a good book is just a tap away."

Certainly not true of any other product!

SDA: "Yup, if you don't have an iPhone, well, you don't have an iPhone."

Tautology moves a lot of product, let me tell you.

The whole series of these ads is so obnoxiously smug that, frankly, it completely turns me off from ever wanting an iPhone. And it's not just that they treat themselves like the hottest shit on the planet. Take this ad, for instance - the iPhone is trying to throw its body in front of e-readers like Amazon's Kindle, Barnes and Noble's Nook, and etc. And that's all well and good, I guess, except that the iPhone isn't really a competitor to those products. It's a phone. It's great how much other stuff it does, but if I want to read a book and don't want an actual book, I'm going to get an e-reader. The iPhone screen is like four inches! Yeah, can't wait to be hunched over Moby-Dick on a screen that size. It's like that T-Mobile commercial that brags about the phone that comes preloaded with Inception, as though anyone is excited to watch Inception, a film noteworthy for its visuals, on a tiny screen in the palm of their hand. I swear, sometimes I feel like the more things they make smartphones do, the less excited I am about it. I want a phone that makes calls and can surf the internet. I don't need to watch tiny, tiny movies or read tiny, tiny books. There are other devices that can do those things on the go in a way that isn't completely stupid, and if I need to do them that badly, I'll get one of those devices.

Are there 80 million variants on how much of a stupid jerk you are for not having an iPhone? Of course there are.

SDA: "If you don't have an iPhone, you don't have an iPod in your phone."

A necessary thing that everyone should have! Also, pretty much every smartphone plays music, asshole.

SDA: "With your music, and your playlists."

Again with the overemphasis on how this will be stuff you like, as though it's not true of anything else. Windows Phone finds out what music you like and then deliberately recommends completely unrelated tracks. Android phones come preloaded exclusively with fifteen remixes of "My Humps" by the Black Eyed Peas. I know the idea is how great it is that the iPhone can sync to iTunes, but really, BFD.

SDA: "And you don't have iTunes on your phone, the world's #1 music store."

Hey, have you heard of iTunes? No? Well, apparently it's some kind of music store. Good thing they told us that, or this ad would have been really confusing. Now it's time for some applesauce - open wide for the airplane!

(My phone, which is not an iPhone as you can probably guess, comes with direct access to the Amazon.com MP3 store, which is basically the exact same thing as the iTunes store. So... no, Apple, I really don't care.)

SDA: "With Genius, that recommends new music based on the songs you already have."

Do not care. At all. Every online music company in the world recommends music based on your established likes. And who buys songs on their phone based on a recommendation without even listening to them first?

SDA: "Yup, if you don't have an iPhone, go fuck yourself."

Well, maybe he didn't say that. But he may as well have. I find the tone of ads like this completely counterproductive. It's 30 seconds of telling any iPhone-less viewer that they're an idiot for not having one because it's just that great. Why would you want to talk down to consumers? Unless that was the point...

Adman 1: Okay, time to get to work on the new iPhone commercial, guys. What should we focus on?

Adman 2: All the great features!

Adman 3: The ways in which it's better than other phones!

Adman 4: The douchey self-satisfaction you get from owning one!

Adman 5: The inherent superiority of iPhone owners to other humans!

Adman 1: Those are all pretty great ideas. Anyone have a slogan?

Adman 4: "If you don't have an iPhone, go get one right now, you stupid twit!"

Adman 5: "If you don't have an iPhone, you probably also don't have a BRAIN!"

Adman 1: Okay, um, not bad, but maybe a little bit too on the nose. We don't want to insult potential customers.

Adman 5: We don't?

Adman 4: The iPhone is still made by Apple, right? I mean, have you ever seen an Apple ad before? Those Mac vs. PC ads are classic examples of insulting the consumer!

Adman 5: Apple products sell themselves by word of mouth. The whole point of the TV ads is just to make people who already own Apple products feel even more satisfied with themselves than they already do. They're like "attaboy" pats on the back for people who own Apple stuff.

Adman 1: Wow. Okay. What about something like "If you don't have an iPhone, you don't have an iPhone?"

Adman 4: ...maybe. But can you get the guy talking to sound like he's much, much better than anyone who doesn't have one?

Adman 5: Gotta have that sense of superiority. It justifies the inflated purchase price.

Adman 1: Okay, I think we're all done here.

The iPhone! If you don't have one, how are you supposed to feel like a better person than all the other losers?

What the Hawk?

I sympathize with makers of local commercials. You're tasked with standing out amid a sea of high-budget national ads that never fail to make your spots look even cheaper than they already would. With that in mind, I can see why a company might opt to borrow ideas from a national campaign for their local ad. However, the eTrade baby is not the one I would have gone with.



Baby: "I'm looking cool in this car! This thing is a stroller magnet! I should work on my pick-up lines."

First of all: no. You should not do that, because you are a baby. Also, note that the baby's body never moves, which is kind of disturbing and just makes him look like a tiny quadriplegic.

Baby: "Hey girl, you need a nap? 'Cause you been crawling through my mind all day."

As awful as the eTrade ads were with their implications of babies having sex with each other, I'm not sure this isn't more blatant than any of those. Baby pick-up lines? Someone really thought this was a good idea?

Baby: "Wow. I'm slaying it!"
[Mom in front seat rolls her eyes]

"Ha! Man. My infant son thinks he's, like, the hottest shit. And he's so not. I would never fuck him if he used that line on me."

Baby: "How about, dang, girl! That diaper's looking good on you."

How about not? How about I'm three seconds away from clawing my own eyes out and shoving them into my ears?

Baby: "What are you, a size 18 months? Yeah, I like my girls a little chubby."
Announcer: "You want some chubby?"

What? What the fuck are you talking about? If this is reliant on me having seen previous ads in whatever fucking series this is, or knowing Hawk Ford's shitty dealership slogan, that is a BAD idea, because I live in Chicago, watch a lot of TV, write about ads as a hobby, and yet can't recall ever seeing one of their ads before. If it's not reliant on that... WHAT?

Announcer: "Chubby discounts. Chubby savings."

WHAT. THE. FUCK. ARE. YOU. TALKING. ABOUT.

Does Hawk Ford know that "chubby" is also a slang term involving the penis? Were they going for that pun? When the baby says that he likes his girls "a little chubby," is that intended to be a play on words, in that he might also have a "little chubby?" Because if so, I want to drive down to Oak Lawn and light that entire dealership on fire.

And if they don't know that, and they weren't going for that pun... what in the hell were they going for?

By the way: "Chubby discounts, chubby savings" isn't even Hawk Ford's normal slogan, as evidenced by these other ads in this campaign. So... a baby calling another baby fat was just so hilarious we had to alter our whole ad to be built around it, in spite of the fact that it makes no goddamn sense? For fuck's sake, at least those other ads use the baby for semi-legit reasons. With this one it just seems like there was a bet in the office about how horrible a commercial they could make and still get it on the air.

It's Greek to me

Beware of Greeks bearing gifts, as the old saying goes. I guess we can modify that to "Beware of Greek grandmothers bearing hummus."



Ye gods. Time for a team effort!

Windier: It's entirely possible that this ad would be hysterically funny if I were Greek, or Greek-American, and had a grandmother like that. But here's the thing. I'm not, and I don't. And the exact same is true of, oh, about 99% of the population (according to Wikipedia, the State Department says that about three million Americans claim Greek heritage). So while I'm sure Jennifer Aniston and Tina Fey find this ad funny and relatable, I'm of the opinion that you kind of need to think of the broader audience. And as a member of the broader audience, I am baffled as to how this is supposed to sell me anything.

Bizarrely smug announcer: "Hey, Michelle! Whatcha doing?"
Michelle: "I'm serving delicious Athenos hummus to my friends! I've got-"
BSA: "That's great! Let's see what Yiayia thinks!"
Yiayia: "You dress like... a prostitute!"

Windier: I have an idea! What if we just totally shit all over someone for using our product? "Ladies, do you like Athenos hummus? Well, so does this old Greek lady, and she also thinks you look like a whore." If you're a woman, and you have a Greek grandmother - or, I suppose, any grandmother from the "old country" who's all "set in her ways" and shit and is also excruciatingly frank - then I suppose you've already been in a situation like this and it's funny. But I must stress again that most people don't, and to those people, I'm guessing the idea of being called a prostitute is about as funny as the actress playing Michelle makes it look. Which is to say, not at all! What was the point of this ad again?

Knitwear: It's hard for me to understand how demoralizing a woman for wearing a perfectly normal dress in a perfectly normal way would help you seem likable. It's unkind and it borders on misogynistic, unlike this other ad in the series for Athenos hummus, which leaps over the border to misogyny land and breaks some plates on the floor, as parenting is a second-class job, a wife is a second-class citizen, and if you're a man, your children should laugh at you for bothering to take a role in raising them. At the same time, this company is attempting to move product. Are you secretly trying to neg these people so that they'll buy more hummus to get back into your good graces? Notice also how cavalierly the announcer dismisses Michelle's plans for the evening - in spite of the fact that Michelle is the customer surrogate in this ad. He wants her (that is, you) to buy the product - but he doesn't care what she (that is, you) thinks.

Michelle: "Did she just call me a prostitute?"
BSA: "No! Yiayia would never do-"
Yiayia: "Prostitute."
BSA: "Never mind that, Michelle! At least Yiayia approves of you serving Athenos hummus!"
Yiayia: "Mmmm!"

Windier: All that I'm really getting out of this ad is the following:

(a) Old Greek women are kind of horrible.
(b) Old Greek women like Athenos hummus and apparently nothing else.
(c) Therefore, you should like Athenos hummus, because it's the only way you're ever going to win the respect of this awful crone.

Sold! Let me run right out and purchase every container in the store! Because when I think delicious food products, my mind goes right to old women who will casually demean you if they don't like your outfit. Here's the official description of the video on YouTube, by the way:

"Yiayia (Greek, for grandmother) is a fan of simple, respectful food made the Greek way. That's why she approves of ATHENOS. And that's why she doesn't approve of anything else."

First of all, what is "respectful food?" I fucking hate shit like that. Don't take adjectives and dilute their meaning by forcing them into completely inapplicable situations. (Also, I think it's pretty clear that if there's one thing Yiayia has absolutely no use for, it's being respectful.) Second of all, what the fuck is this, Life cereal? "Give this Athenos hummus to Yiayia, she doesn't like anything. She likes it! Hey Yiayia!" And I still don't see how this is going to encourage me to purchase the product. You can just see Michelle in the last scene thinking how quickly she can get to the store for some Tribe or Sabra or whatever.

Knitwear: Third of all, let's not pretend that hummus is some sort of classic Greek food. I'm sure you could find it in a grocery store somewhere in Greece, but it's not like you're going to unearth some sort of ancient pottery shard depicting Zeus with a big platter of hummus and pita.
Extensive research went into making sure this ad "properly reflected Greek culture," so I'm glad they went that extra mile to include both an authentic Greek food and the special importance placed on nurturing your children (or not).

Windier: Here's the slogan this ad probably should have ended with, for consistency's sake: "Athenos Hummus: So authentically delicious, it'll be just like a Greek woman is horribly insulting you while you're eating it! Mmmm. Pick some up today!" You're already in your car on your way to the store, right?

This isn't the only ad in the series, as Knitwear mentions above. In addition to the one where Yiayia suggests that being a stay-at-home dad is unmanly, there's also one where she tells a couple living together but unmarried that they're going to Hell. For real. But hey! She loves Athenos products! So, um, enjoy! This hummus will surely distract you from your sinful modern lifestyles! I don't care how much like anyone's grandmother this woman is - why would I want to buy any product she's endorsing? If this is "Greek authenticity," I'll be fine with a less authentic brand, thanks.

Knitwear: And it's Greek authenticity only in the most calculated way imaginable, which is probably my favorite part. "Athenos! We're Greek! Greeky Greek Greek! (Kraft.)" Anyway, despite the controversy following the first airings of the ad this week, the company stands behind their commercial. Kraft, meet Groupon. Groupon, Kraft. I'm sure you two will have lots to talk about.

StopDaddy

Three guesses as to what you will see if you go online to "see more now" at the end of this ad, and the first two don't count.



If you said "Danica Patrick and Jillian Michaels are NOT naked," you're right! (If you additionally said, "It's excruciatingly unfunny and you will instantly regret watching it just to remove the 0.0000000001% of doubt you had before posting this," you are also right.)

Don't you wonder why GoDaddy is still making ads this way? At first, I get it. You want to get your name out there. But everyone knows who GoDaddy is by now and yet we get functionally the exact same thing every year - the ad implies that if you go online for the full version you will see nudity or at the very least something extremely risqué; you of course will not; and for some reason GoDaddy refuses to cast anyone who would be worth the effort anyway. For crying out loud, I could type virtually any sexual term into Google and find video of a more attractive woman than Danica Patrick doing unspeakable things inside of thirty seconds.

Just for good measure, this year's spot adds Jillian Michaels, because two passably attractive brunettes are better than one, even if neither of them can act worth a lick. Neither Michaels nor Patrick is hot enough to justify appearing in these spots, right? Surely you could find someone around their level who could act, or at least find someone hotter who can't. Maybe it seems kind of sexist for me to harp on this, but come on - their entire premise is "We're using hot ladies to sell domain names." You can't do that and then not provide hot ladies.

If you hate yourself, do be sure to check out the full online spot, which ranks right up there with the worst associated web content to a televised ad I've ever seen. Although it is sort of impressive how many people they managed to cast who lack the ability to competently deliver a line.

Making bad ads isn't exactly rocket science

Last September I mentioned a Honda Civic ad that I hated and wanted to write about but was unable to find on YouTube. Well, guess what I just found.



Come on.

Applicant: "Mr. Stratton, thank you."
Stratton: "We'll be in touch."
[Applicant leaves]
Stratton: "Seems bright."
Tom: "I don't know, Hank."

What is with the crazy low-angle shots here? Did I need to be able to see all the way up that guy's nose? Was Verne Troyer the cameraman?

Stratton: "Tom?"
Tom: "I think we just found our next rocket scientist."

They looked out the window and saw that the applicant dude drives a Honda Civic. And that pushed him over the top! As if this makes any sense at all. "Sure, your qualifications are impeccable... but I don't know, is that a Ford Taurus you're driving? I'm sorry, I think we need more of a Honda Civic man for this job." Alternately, what if this guy isn't even qualified to be a rocket scientist? "Well, we reviewed your application, and it says that your only previous work with rockets was 'shooting off some bottle rockets on Fourth of July 1997.' So I'm afraid that... wait a second, is that a Honda fucking Civic?"

Announcer: "It can take you farther than you think."

See, I could write the whole thing off as a joke - a really awful, stupid joke, but a joke - if they didn't have this line in there. They are serious! They are legitimately claiming that if your potential boss appreciates your taste in cars, you will get hired. And why?

Announcer: "The best value of any car in its class for the past 23 years."

Okay, first of all, out of context that really doesn't mean much. Second of all, does an appreciation of value make you a better rocket scientist? Wouldn't this make at least a little more sense if he was being hired as an economist or something? Oh, but "economist" isn't a profession that is widely used as shorthand for "genius-level intelligence," so we can't go with that. We need everyone to understand that buying a Honda Civic is proof that you are so smart that you can design spacecraft. And if you don't buy a Honda Civic? Well, I think Arby's is hiring for the night shift, jerkoff. The irony of the whole thing is that "rocket scientist" is probably a pretty high-paying job - what are even the odds that this guy would still be driving a Civic within five years?

Sub-Optima

This isn't some ridiculously terrible commercial or anything. It's just kind of a mess.



I suspect this is what happens when there are six ideas in the pitch meeting and they just decide to use them all. My prevailing thought about this ad is that the first piece of the plotline, which depicts a couple handcuffed to a cop's motorcycle as the cop drives away in their Kia Optima, would probably have been sufficient by itself for the entire ad. You start with the couple driving, cop pulls them over, cop looks the car over and is taken by it, cop has the couple step out of the car, then hops in and drives away. Gets the point across, doesn't make wild, random lurches between events in something that can only charitably be called a narrative, and is at least conceptually amusing.

But does this ad stop there? No. In fact, it doesn't even start until right at the end of that piece of the plot. Instead, we move on to a helicopter grabbing the car with a giant suction cup and flying out across the ocean to deliver the car to some rich guy on a yacht. (Apparently this takes place in an alternate dimension where there is only one Kia Optima in existence, because surely with a base MSRP of around $20k, dude could afford his own. Hell, hiring that helicopter and fitting it out with the suction gadget probably cost more than that.) But does the yacht get to the rich guy? No. Because - watch the ad, this actually happens - fucking Poseidon pops out of the ocean, knocks the helicopter away, and examines the car.

Okay. I say this a lot on here, perhaps too much, but it's too often applicable: I know this is supposed to be funny. Or something. But I just find it stupid and "lookit me!" What use does Poseidon have for a car that he's like 20 times larger than? Or at all? Maybe it's just going to be a present for his daughter's Sweet Sixteen - not to drive, mind you, because they live under the sea, but to add to her collection of human items. She can admire the car as it slowly rusts, all the while humming "Part of Your World" and combing her hair with a dinglehopper. Or maybe this is kind of retarded and could just as easily have been left out, except that Kia apparently really wanted to show off more of their mediocre CGI.

Then aliens zap the car away, but they lose it as well, as the car is pulled through some sort of wormhole and ends up in Mayan times, ready to be worshiped as some sort of god. Okay. How do the Mayans know what a car is? What are they going to do with it?

So in 60 seconds the car is possessed by six different entities (I'm including the couple at the beginning, who technically have already been dispossessed before the 60 seconds start). Doesn't this seem a little frantic? Am I the only one who finds it sort of distracting and muddled? You'd think the idea of an ad like this would be to focus on the car, but in sixty seconds it seems to me that only about seven of them - 0:05 to 0:08, when the cop is driving, and 0:37 to 0:41, when the alien is driving - really show the car doing anything besides being pulled from one place to the next. A 60-second car commercial and barely more than 10% of it actually shows the car in action? (It could be worse, of course.)

That might even be okay if there were anything particularly distinctive about the Kia Optima... but it's a mid-size sedan, a.k.a. the most conventional automotive category in existence. Virtually every car in that category looks at least 80% like all the others, and the Optima hardly looks like an exception. It's not a hybrid, it's not electric... the only thing we know about it is that everyone in this ad wants it, which is hardly a convincing argument. Shit, even that awful Cruze ad cited the car's MPG. The only thing we get at the end is the starting price (which is only if you want it in manual, by the way). I mean, for all I know there are lots of awesome things you can get with the Kia Optima - for six million bucks, plus whatever it cost to produce, is it too much to ask that this ad mention any of them? Or should I just be thankful that no more hamsters showed up?

Coffee-mating ritual

Holy shit, Coffee-Mate. Really?



Express yourself! Reveal your true self to the world... by adding flavored creamer to your coffee. For real. Drinking flavored coffee is the equivalent of writing a song, or painting, or dressing in interesting clothing to stand out. Never mind that no one else will have ANY IDEA what flavor is in your coffee unless you tell them, and hey, that wouldn't be weird at all.

Office Worker 1: Morning, Bill.
Office Worker 2: Morning, Tom.
Office Worker 1: So, how are things?
Office Worker 2: Not bad. Especially since I'm drinking this... [holds up mug] ...hazelnut coffee! [takes sip] Mmm. You know, hazelnut-flavored coffee really speaks to me as a person...
Office Worker 1: Well, gosh, I would love to stay and chat, but I'm late for my exit interview!
Office Worker 2: You're leaving?
Office Worker 1: I am now!

Honestly, I would buy Miracle Whip as the edgy youth condiment before I would buy Coffee-Mate as an expression of self. Plus, what if you like your coffee black?

Office Worker 2: To me, hazelnut speaks to my artistry. I don't even feel like I can create until I've had at least three cups... but once I have, the creative juices start flowing and I feel like I can do anything with the canvas.
Office Worker 3: I hear you. I could barely muster the energy to press the keys on the piano until I had my second cup with the Cinnamon Bun flavor, but once I did, I was ready to knock out a concerto.
Office Worker 4: Morning, guys. Mind if I squeeze through to pour a cup?
Office Worker 2: Of course not, fellow coffee aficionado! So what'll it be for you today?
Office Worker 4: Um, coffee?
Office Worker 2: Well, of course. I meant what flavor of Coffee-Mate?
Office Worker 4: Oh, I just like it black.
Office Worker 2: I'm sorry?
Office Worker 4: Black. You know, no cream, no sugar, just straight?
Office Worker 3: I don't understand.
Office Worker 4: ...well, see, I'm just going to drink this...
[He puts it to his lips, but Office Worker 3 slaps it away.]
Office Worker 3: Good God, man! Do you realize what you almost did? There's nothing in there! No French vanilla, no amaretto, no gingerbread... it's just... it's just...
Office Worker 4: Coffee?
[Office Workers 2 and 3 shudder.]
Office Worker 2: I don't even like to think about it.

Coffee-Mate! Life needs flavor! Specifically, mass-produced flavor that you can pour out of a plastic bottle. Be your own person and express yourself by purchasing goods from a major multinational corporation!

(By the way, Coffee-Mate's website has a whole section dedicated to desserts they want you to make using Coffee-Mate for the flavors. I will say this right now: if you're making tiramisu or crème brûlée at home and you're using Coffee-Mate in the recipe, you have truly gone dead inside.)

Hamstering it up

It's about time I got around to this one.



This ad, from early 2009 or so, is a good commercial. It's a clever use of interesting visuals to communicate, getting across the idea that the Kia Soul is distinct from the many cookie-cutter cars on the road. It even gets in a couple facts about the car at the end.

Unfortunately, Kia bought into the hamsters maybe a little too much.



What the hell is that mess?

It seems pretty clear that I'm not in this ad's target demographic (the references to 145th Street and Amsterdam Avenue place the setting quite conspicuously in Harlem). But it's still baffling. First of all, Kia makes the pretty bold assumption that you remember their earlier hamster ad - it was a good ad, but it wasn't exactly "Have you had your break today?" Even beyond that, the two ads have virtually nothing in common beyond the hamsters - the hamster wheels make only a fleeting appearance in the sequel, the hamsters have now been dressed up in all manner of clothing, and Calvin Harris' "Colours" (an electronica song from 2007) has been replaced with Black Sheep's "The Choice is Yours" (a hip hop song from 1991). Really, why did they even bother to keep the hamsters? Surely the branding from the first commercial wasn't that valuable if they just threw out everything else.

Gone is the clever suggestion that the competition is like a bunch of identical hamster wheels; in its place are comparisons to a toaster and a cardboard box. Is this still supposed to represent the competition? Is it supposed to represent the used cars that might be the only other alternative for someone shopping in the Kia Soul's price range? It's impossible to say for sure when Kia is dealing entirely in metaphors. I don't know. Maybe if I lived in Harlem this ad would make perfect sense... but somehow I doubt that.

It's also worth noting that by giving the hamsters so much more to do, Kia has successfully called attention to the not-especially-good CGI they're employing in that department. The first ad seemed like it might have been mostly real hamsters until the end; I can't imagine there's a real hamster for even a frame in this commercial, and it's painfully obvious. Does that really matter? Probably not. But it looks cheap. I don't know, maybe that was the point.

A piece of Kraft

I decided to look into the Crispin Porter + Bogusky oeuvre to see what else they'd done, because in spite of our hate for the Groupon and Best Buy ads, and our historical hate for their Burger King and Microsoft campaigns, surely, surely they must not exclusively produce crap ads, right?

I'm still looking.



You know what I don't love? Ads that take a product traditionally aimed at children and try to pretend that it's something that is or should be beloved by adults. I've never been able to turn up proof of this, but I'm quite sure that sometime in the early to mid-1990s Cookie Crisp started running ads suggesting that adults could also eat it as kind of a snack food. It was ridiculous then, and it's ridiculous now.

If you've ever had real macaroni and cheese - I mean made from scratch - you know that Kraft's equivalent is like mixing baker's chocolate with Splenda and calling it a Belgian truffle. It is not good. And sure, each to his own taste, but it's objectively of lower quality, even if you still like it. There's no way this dad is so obsessed with it that he's just standing there cramming it into his stupid face.

Of course, that ad is more annoying than truly terrible. Don't worry. It gets worse.



I hate nearly everything about this one.

Girl: "So get this. Kraft Mac and Cheese, but it's in a bag."

Everyone was familiar with the fact that it came in a box, right? And cared?

Girl: "And you bake it. In the oven."

Thereby taking away the only real reason to eat Kraft Mac and Cheese in the first place, which is that it takes slightly less time to make than to make real macaroni and cheese from scratch.

Girl: "Whatever happened to Cheeseasaurus Rex? I love that guy!"

WARNING: MASSIVE EDITORIALIZING OF OUR OWN ADS! "Hey, remember our shitty old mascot we just got rid of? He was totally super popular!" I'm surprised CP+B's recent Domino's ads didn't have people demanding the return of the Noid, too. Also, what's this kid, 9? How long has it been since Cheeseasaurus Rex was actually named in the Kraft ads?

Girl: "Well, Kraft Corporation, I'm on to you. Going after the grownups and trying to muscle me out?"

Revealing your marketing strategy in your copy: super edgy.

Girl: "But I'm not going anywhere."

Yeah, Kraft Mac and Cheese is likely to still be more enjoyed by kids than adults. What was the point of this ad?

As the mac and cheese is pulled out of the oven, pay close attention to the fine print, which states: "Optional oven finish." So basically you're trying to make it look classy on TV, but the fact is that most people are not going to bother to do that extra work as though bread crumbs will make you think your grandma made this.

Announcer: "New Kraft Homestyle Macaroni and Cheese. Cheesy noodles topped with golden brown bread crumbs."

So macaroni and cheese. Only not as good.

Announcer: "You know you love it."

I loathe this tagline. Absolutely hate it. Why is this the pitch? Seems to me the idea is that adults secretly love Kraft Mac and Cheese but refuse to admit it because it's supposed to be for kids. As though, being adults, we don't have the option to buy whatever the fuck we want. If I want to buy Kraft Mac and Cheese, I will. But I don't, because it sucks, no matter how many bread crumbs you sprinkle on it. Don't try to tell me what I love and don't love, Kraft, you assholes. I will make my own grocery buying decisions and you will like it. Fuck you.

And here's the latest one.



Is that the same girl? She looks pretty similar. If so, did her mom recently suffer some sort of brain injury that caused her to forget about Kraft Macaroni and Cheese? (Wouldn't that be the life.)

Let's say that it's either a different girl or is supposed to be. How does this ad make sense? If the mom has never purchased Kraft, then the kid has never had it; if the kid has never had it, how does she know to want it? Even if you assume it's because she saw an ad for it, she seems really certain of how good it's going to taste for someone who's never eaten it.

I'm also no fan of the disdain with which this ad treats the mother's cooking. Okay, so Kraft is trying to "eliminate its competition" or whatever, something common enough in the ad world. But this seems questionable at best. "Hey! Parents! You know the food you're cooking and serving to your kids? Yeah, they fucking hate it. Get with the program and start making them pasta from a bag, and maybe when the revolution comes you won't be the first against the wall. Kraft: We Will Destroy You. I mean, You Know You Love It."

Guess what, Kraft. I didn't like it when Pizza Hut took this angle and I don't like it now. You make shitty processed pasta in a bag and/or box. This is no one's idea of a wonder meal (well, maybe this guy's). Unless someone is a particularly bad cook, it probably does not outclass something they made from scratch, and the idea that we should all just stop making real food and settle for pre-packaged crap is obnoxious at best. Or, why not go the other way and just make the tagline that much clearer?

Kraft: You Know You Can't Cook

Kraft: You Know Your Kids Hate You

Kraft: Stop Embarrassing Yourself

Kraft: Fuck You and the Casserole You Rode In On

Mind over Chatter

Do you suppose there is really a huge overlap between "people who are big fans of the Black Eyed Peas" and "people who make major software decisions for businesses"?



I have my doubts that the Black Eyed Peas actually use this service. But whatever.

Announcer: "Will.i.am, what do you think about the cloud?"

Better first question: "What the fuck is the cloud?"

Will.i.am: "The cloud? You mean this guy?"

Oh, I guess it's an actual cloud? Question answered! Or, not. At all.

Will.i.am: "Chatty? Man, I love this dude."

I might suggest that it is a bad idea, when attempting to introduce a new product to a mass audience, to have your main pitchman call the product by a different name. "Hey, what's that thing called? Chatty? Chatter? Chatbox? Chat Stevens?"

Will.i.am: "He helps me and my team stay aligned, so like, we all on the same page and stuff."

Thought: when attempting to sell a product that needs to be pitched to manager-level employees at companies, don't describe its function as making sure that "like, we all on the same page and stuff." This product is aimed at business professionals, not 12-year-olds from Encino.

Will.i.am: "I'm sorry, that's my phone. But hey look, check it out: Fergie be showing me tour updates, Taboo's showing me all the fly shoe designs, and Apl's letting me know where the DJ gigs at."

I guess these are things that this service does better than any other? It's sort of impossible to say, since your spokespeople are the Black Eyed Peas, and 99.9% of the people who will use this are not part of musical groups that also dabble in shoe design. Also, why are they the "Baby Peas" in this ad? And why did they need to be animated?

Will.i.am: "You see, we keep our whole business up there. It's private, and most importantly, it's safe."

Actually somewhat meaningful, I guess.

Fergie: "Will, let's go!"
Will.i.am: "Oh, yo, I gotta go on stage!"
Announcer: "Do impossible things as a team. Chatter.com."

And Apl and Taboo get what I imagine is the usual shaft. The slogan is "Do impossible things as a team?" Impossible things? Unless your company is working on the first time machine, maybe we could just stick with a verb like "incredible," which would have been just as good for the ad's purposes without sounding ludicrously overblown.

Seriously, why are the Black Eyed Peas in this ad? Even though Chatter is supposed to be a Facebook/Twitter equivalent, it's still only like that within the confines of a professional setting. Was there really that much of a need to "cool up" the ad with will.i.am's presence? Even if there was, I still don't understand why they're the "Baby Peas" or why they're animated. For all the sense it makes, will.i.am might just as well have been 500 feet tall and stomping through the streets of Tokyo, or rendered in Rankin/Bass-style stop-motion, or depicted with oozing sores and a hacking cough as "ill.i.am" of the "Garbage Pail Peas." Or maybe this commercial could have been way, way more straightforward, used someone less famous but more relevant, and given more than a whiff of a suggestion of what Chatter is actually good for.