h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

So who's smelling his pants??

I saw that ad with the woman putting all her clothes on last night... bloody ridiculous.

I heard an advert for Jack Daniel's on the radio this morning. It was in the typical Jack Daniel's advertising mode, saying how great life was in Lynchburg*, Tennessee. Ho hum, so far so boring. At the end, however, they say "Jack is best enjoyed responsibly".

Can I ask for a second opinion from those I acknowledge as experts in this field: Roymondo and Serephina spring immediately to mind! *Is* Jack "best enjoyed responsibly?" **

RF

* Not a very friendly-sounding town name though...
** I expect the answer to be "HELL, no!"

I don't know - I don't think I've ever tried enjoying it responsibly.

That's pretty well as I expected.

RF

TV ads seem to get worse over Chrimbo period, no?. I think that folk generally lower thier guard over Christmas - this possibly also explains how novelty records get in the charts at Christmas.

People get into "buying mode" and will buy anything. They get used to handing over money. Door to door salesmen apparently have their best time of year just now. Charities do well too.

I'm wondering about all those ads, clearly for things that they want you to buy people for christmas rather than the Boxing Day Sales, which come on AFTER the shops close on Christmas Eve.

Do advertisers really pay for those?

I've noticed one that intrigues me.

Why does everyone in adverts for leather sofas, or reclining chairs, appear barefooted? No socks, no slippers, no shoes. Men, women, kids, dogs and cats.......all barefooted.

except for the ones who put their feet on them...

I'm convinced there is an agency that provides smaller than average actors to leap, recline and relax on those sofas. I'm not particularly tall, but I've rarely seen a sofa that I could stretch out fully on, and not be touching the arm-rests with my head and toes. The ones in the ads seem to engulf those happy herberts, ergo, the herberts are hired for their lack of height to seruptitiously enlarge the furniture on offer.

I don't know about Brit advertising but they would have to go far to beat some of our daft offerings. The one that sticks in my mind is of a dandelion seed blowing in the wind across vast tracks of landscape with pretty tinkling music in the background(sickened so far?)The ad is for a power company encouraging us to use more electricity,this is usually followed by the evening news telling us that power prices are going up!My preferred vision of the ad's ending would be for some bright spark to come out and spray the thing with weedkiller!Poetic justice I would say.

>> I'm convinced there is an agency that provides smaller than average actors to leap, recline and relax on those sofas. I'm not particularly tall, but I've rarely seen a sofa that I could stretch out fully on <<

You'll also notice that all those actors live in unfeasibly large, clutter-free houses.

Welcome to advertisingland!

RF

What really bugs me is the way furniture prices in ads are always given a digits rather than whole numbers. Y'know, "this sofa only costs four-nine-nine!" I can only assume that it's a persykological method of making the price seem lower (a 21st century version of "Under £500"?), but I refuse to believe that people are really that stupid (and I live in Swindon).

that drives mad too
for me... I'm trying to work out if SCS is a spinn off of DFS or something

Anyone seen the ad for the indisgestion remedy that has a fireman with a big pink hose spraying white stuff down a woman's throat?


Or is it just me?

Yes!!!

RF

I've seen it and (inhale): AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH! What's with that stupid, horrid, annoying song, from the awful ing film??!!! And the entire campaign has the same song- please! It's horrible!! Stop it!!! The Ketchup song would be better, the Cheeky Girls would sound almost classy in comparison....

I also hated the Arg*s advert with the dad climbing on the stars and the moon to pluck down a Christmas wish and bring it the place where dreams come true, 'coz he wants his boy to be the happiest little boy in Christmas. There are SO many things that are wrong in this adver, but the jolly way in which the smarmy bugg*r climbs (only wearing a scarf, by the way, in a typical freezing cold british night) the star and the moon is nauseating. And we ALL want our kids to be happy, that's why you make a wish list, not risk death!

Talking of furniture ads, I really enjoyed one recently featuring a certain ex 80s pop star / Eastenders actor.

It immediately followed a local news report regarding the very same company and a large number of people who'd ordered sofas from them with "guaranteed delivery before Christmas", but who presumably spent Christmas sitting on the floor

That effin Gillette advert where the guy's son shows him how to use his phone, ipod etc. I mean, wtf? Is he the world's coolest dad with Parkinson's?

And also, if I had every gadget known to man I'd hardly be impressed by a fxxkin razor for Christmas. I hate that bloody advert.