Tippex eh? Anyone still using that in the so-called ‘digital’ age? No, thought not. Somewhere there’s an abandoned Tippex factory, with ex-Monkee in the middle of it, rocking back and forth in the foetal position as he wonders where his inheritance has gone.

But all that could change, thanks to a new YouTube-based marketing viral interactive video thingy that Tippex have launched and that is sweeping the nation, nay globe, RIGHT BLOODY NOW.

It looks like a simple ad but it’s more, so much more. And yes, the obvious one DOES work.

If we’re arse-baringly honest about it, the BT ads featuring manchild Kris Marshall getting some dreary MILF up the duff were about as stimulating as a handjob from Tattoo in Fantasy Island. Cringing dialogue counterpointed by advertising messages so obvious they caused blunt force trauma (”FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, PLEASE USE YOUR HOME LANDLINE”) left the audience feeling like they’d watched 30 seconds of milk curdling.

But where to next? How can BT possibly top an improbably poor advertising campaign that will fade from the memory quicker than Steve Brookstein? With this:

Avid Bitterwallet reader Justin gets enough crap shovelled through his door, without the need for scummy faux flyers that smack of desperation: “After their online badger-bating they’ve now stooped to paper snail-mail shots that approximate broadband to a cat.” Stay classy, BT. And for the love of sweet baby Jesus, stop giving money to Kris Marshall.

Yesterday, we commemorated the anniversary of the death of Princess Diana in as tasteful a way as we could muster – by showing you an old ad where a lookalike of the People’s Princess whizzes through the night in a car.

Unfortunately, not everyone treats the memory of the Queen Of Hearts with such respect and reverence. Check out this DISGUSTING advert from China for a range of lingerie that is tastelessly named after Her Deadjesty.

Horrible isn’t it? While also being fiercely arousing, obviously. Our in-house translators (the Daily Mail’s website) tell us that the ad urges us to ‘Feel the Romance of British Royalty’.

We’ve been gawping at it for an hour and there’ll be something getting else felt before long if we’re being completely honest…

A couple of days ago we featured a Japanese ad where a couple of big fat blokes had painted their ample stomachs and man-boobs to make them look like heads. Oh, what a pip!

Now our attention is drawn to another marketing campaign featuring body paint and boobs – except this time it’s not man-boobs but REAL boobs!

The campaign is by the Breast Cancer Foundation and is a bit more clever and subtle than dressing some girls up in pink and have them play with baking toys.

So don’t ogle the boobs – we’re showing you this to raise awareness and nothing else…

(more…)

It’s always refreshing when a company drop the bland corporate-speak when personally interacting with their customers. So with that in mind, it’s hats off to Paperchase.

But it’s not so cool and groovy when they’re rude and patronising to their customers, especially when said customer has raised a valid point about gender stereotyping in their advertising. So it’s hats back on (or whatever the opposite of hats off is) to Paperchase.

Blogger and Paperchase fan Nancy Smallwood took umbrage recently at the window display in their Tottenham Court Road branch in the centre of That London’s fashionable That London. Advertising ‘back to school’ stuff, Paperchase had deployed a ‘pink is for girls’ and ‘blue is for boys’ theme, with pictures of the girls doing bakery and the boys playing with sharks and similar tough stuff and that.

An email of complaint was dashed off by Nancy, including points like…

“More than ever now big companies need to be trying to advocate equality for both sexes, and break down gender stereotypes, and in this day and age I was pretty disappointed to see this ridiculous cop out.”

She ended with “I’m a big fan of your store, as I said, but I’d really hope in future you could try harder to avoid this kind of nonsense.”

Fair points, well made. Well, not according to Robert Warden, the Marketing Director of Paperchase. His reply, dispatched around twenty minutes later was this…

Thank you for your email. However you rather miss the point… we are more than aware of the gender stereotypes and were making an ironic point by using archive mail-order catalogue photos from the 1970s…

When we are trying to sell stationery (please note spelling) there are images that appeal to boys and images that appeal to girls – and we have had a very successful season with the designs that we chose. So presumably the majority of our customers approved of the products.

Yours sincerely
Robert Warden

Presumably he also stuck out his tongue and waggled his fingers from either side of his head as he sent the email. Some nice pedantry regarding the spelling of ‘stationery’ there as well. We like a bit of pedantry round these parts.

There was more to come. Naturally, Nancy was unhappy with Warden’s response and probed him further on the inherent message in the Paperchase marketing merchandising. She sent a further email, pointing out that… “I wasn’t looking for you to argue that it sells well as a defence, rather an apology and demonstrate an awareness of the issues that I complained about (and not in the ironic 1970s – or should that be 1950s? – sense.”

A reply duly followed from Robert Warden.

Thank you for your email.

Consumerism is, first and foremost, a choice. Whether our campaign is subtle is not (… it is always reassuring to know that customers assume they can be rude to us but do not like being corrected themselves) is in the eyes of the beholder.

Our customers specifically asked for ‘boys’ stationery – and as we are trying to run a commercial enterprise (one of the reasons being to keep people in employment) – we did our best to provide something we thought 7 year old boys might appreciate either buying or being given. No-one has forced them to buy it.

If 7 year old girls are keen on sharks they can buy it too ! I leave the disagreements between us there – we shall continue to try not to offend all our customers.
Yours sincerely
Robert Warden

Since Nancy wrote about her interaction with Paperchase and Warden, the blogosphere has erupted with condemnation of the attitude the Marketing Director has taken towards a genuine complaint from a customer.

But how bad is it really? Should we be pleased that a ‘suit’ has tried to engage directly with a customer for once and explain why the merchandising looks the way it does, even if his social skills left a little to be desired?

Or is it unacceptable behaviour from Paperchase and should an effigy of Robert Warden be hoisted up on a pole and burned outside the Tottenham Court Road store for crimes against gender equality?

What do YOU LOT reckon? Eh?

And so once more, The Daily Mail has been found guilty of breaking advertising rules and telling consumers a porkie or two. Specifically, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has found the newspaper in breach of no less than six regulations and declared the promotion to be misleading and untruthful. Boom.

If you want to read the ASA’s report for yourself, you’ll find it here. Essentially the paper offered cheap family holidays, and enticed readers to apply with big shiny headlines, hiding away the pertinent detail in very small print, as well as failing to mention that availability of the holidays was heavily restricted at peak times. There were other misdemeanours but you get the idea; the ASA upheld three separate complaints.

So given the serious nature of the matter, in that consumers were thoroughly misled by the promotion, what decisive action has the ASA taken against the paper?

“The promotion must not appear again in its current form.”

Here’s the thing. The promotion won’t appear in its current form again – not by virtue of the Daily Mail having a sudden fit of morals and making good on its misleading behaviour, but by virtue of the linear passage of time. The promotion is done, finished with – it won’t happen in its current form again, not because of the ASA’s adjudication, but because a time machine would be required for the same advert with the same particulars to run once more.

The truth is the same companies continue to break the advertising rules, over and over, and as soon as complaints are upheld, they simply tweak the message and do it all over again. This is the fifth time that The Mail and The Mail on Sunday have had complaints upheld this year alone. BT, another company in the headlines today for bending the rules concerning broadband speeds, has been found in breach of the ASA regulations no less than a dozen times in just over two years.

While the ASA likes to think that upheld complaints serves as an example to other advertisers, it’s fair to suggest their actions can never deter those companies with large marketing budgets. They can sustain a misleading advertising message that far outweighs a single day of bad press. Advertising works through repetition of the message, through frequency – so it’s the advertiser that’ll always win a confrontation with the ASA. Every time.

All the ASA can do is request that other bodies consider punishing offenders. For example:

“For misleading or unfair advertising, if an advertiser refuses to comply with the ASA, then the ASA Chief Executive is able to refer the advertiser to the Office of Fair Trading for legal proceedings.

“Such referrals are rarely necessary, as most advertisers prefer to resolve the matter directly with us.”

And how are such matters resolved with the ASA? By the advertiser promising not to run the same advert again. Oh. Only Ryanair seems to have been sent to the OFT for bad behaviour, while plenty of others continue misleading consumers with impunity.

“Our aim at the ASA is to ensure that consumers do not just enjoy the ads they see, but they can trust them too.”

Except you can’t trust them, can you? Ultimately it seems that any advertiser can say what they want, as often as they want, because advertising can deliver a misleading message unchallenged for weeks, and the ASA can only ever limply tackle it with a day of bad press.

Sponsored search results – sometimes those clever algorithms in the background do a perfect job of recognising a search term and pairing it with the appropriate advertiser. Other times, less so:

Either eBay are also willing to sell you a time machine as part of the deal, or they’ve discovered a way to raise the dead. Thanks to avid Bitterwallet reader Hank.

Oh, this is just UTTERLY SUBLIME. Two of our most favourite things of the past week or so have been the story about hardcore animal rights warriors PETA kicking off about a Dodge car ad starring a monkey (or chimp or whatever the fuck it is) dressed as Evel Knievel and the Taiwanese animated news report about the flight attendant who threw a wobbler.

Now, as the internet and the world itself slowly closes in on itself, we get a combination of the two – Taiwan news recreating the PETA story in their own inimitable animated stylee. It’s glorious stuff so suck it all up.

It’s quite a bold claim to make, but we assume the Swiss firm behind this advert for a bicycle manufacturer – as spotted by eagle-eyed Bitterwallet reader Luke – can provided substantial evidence that riding one will see you getting some yankee doodle in less than 24 hours:

Ever wondered what it would be like if those wonders of the modern age that we like to call Facebook, Skype and YouTube had been invented in a bygone era? Look, it’s almost the weekend, so just pretend that you have. Pretend that you wonder it ALL THE TIME, okay?

Good, that’s better. You’ve probably also wondered what the marketing campaigns would be like for those aforementioned modern services as well haven’t you? JUST NOD YOUR HEAD SLOWLY!

Thank you. Now, thanks, to some Brazilian ad agency, we can get something of an idea. Here’s the ad they came up with for Facebook and you can see the others here.

Right, now you can go back to eating your chicken in a can…

So, hey, let’s raise some awareness, yeah? With a groovy new campaign from Toyota which they claim will help reduce our fuel consumption while driving.

It’s called A Glass Of Water and all you have to do is drive around with a glass of water perched on your dashboard. Except that, erm, you don’t actually. Because that would be a bit messy.

The idea is to imagine that you’ve got the aforementioned glass of water on the dashboard, which in turn stops you tootling around the roads like a top-speed wanker, which in turn reduces your fuel consumption.

It all sounds a bit fishy to us – we knew a bloke who used to drive to work with a huge Pyrex jug filled with Stella wedged between his knees but he lost his pancreas in the end. Not the same thing really is it?

Taken from the strange and distant world of vintage advertising, here’s a young man who isn’t prepared to let a small problem like being a baby from stopping him getting involved in grown-up, adult stuff like shaving.

The poster’s slogan says ‘No stropping, no honing’ but if any of the babies we know had a bash at this, there’d be a major strop within seconds.

Have times really changed since this advert was made? Is this any better or worse than a deranged pop star dangling a baby over a balcony to the delight of hundreds of his fans? It’s so confusing.

More shaving news soon!

[Boing Boing]

Is this REALLY what we want as early as August?

Hang out the decorations, slap on the Santa suit and let joy be unconfined – the run-up to Christmas is almost upon us!

Yes, the summer solstice is but a distant memory and it’s time for us all to start looking forward to the naked commercialism that is the 21^st century British Christmas. If you don’t include those weird shops that sell Christmas stuff all year round, it seems that the whole shebang is kicking off on August 2^nd at Selfridges in London’s fashionable That London’s buzzing Oxford Street.

That’s an amazing 145 days before the actual day when we get together and celebrate the birthday of the baby Jesus with presents and turkey and booze and sweets and inter-familal brawling. It beats Selfridges previous record by a good six days as well.

Geraldine James, Selfridges Christmas Shop’s buying manager, said: “Christmas is coming earlier each year.” Yes it is, and it’s thanks to cynical, grabbing overkill merchants like bloody fucking Selfridges. Happy bastard August everyone.

Thanks to avid Bitterwallet reader Tom for pointing out yet another example of the sterling efforts of the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), the body responsible for enforcing advertising guidelines.

There’s no real way to write this one up without it losing a touch of its brilliance, so we’ve reproduced it below – or you can read it on the ASA website:

ASA Adjudication on Mr Morro

Ad
A circular, for Mr Morro, stated “African Spiritual Healer Mr Morro Can Help with your Problems Maintain family ties and Relationships Keep loved ones, gives you and your family wellbeing Sustain love and enliven love, get rid of bad luck, Black Magic Or get rid of Evil Spirits from the affect [sic] one. Become Healthy from Sickness of all kinds He is also capable of solving all Psychological, Financials [sic], Socials [sic] and Academic problems …”.

Issue
The complainant challenged whether Mr Morro could prove that he could get rid of bad luck and evil spirits, perform black magic, heal all types of sickness and solve all psychological, financial, social and academic problems.

Assessment

Upheld
In the absence of any documentary evidence to prove that Mr Morro could get rid of bad luck and evil spirits, perform black magic, heal all types of sickness and solve all psychological, financial, social and academic problems, we concluded that the claims were unsubstantiated and misleading.

Action
The ad must not appear again in its current form. We told Mr Morro not to claim that he could get rid of bad luck and evil spirits, perform black magic, heal all types of sickness and solve all psychological, financial, social and academic problems.

The animal fans at PETA are back with another ad featuring a scantily-clad lady. In the recent past, they’ve tried to bring us around to their way of thinking (whatever that might be) with a host of ads starring hot young models, but this time they’re targeting the MILF-loving crowd with an appearance by Pamela Anderson. Voila.

As you can see, the former Baywatch and sex tape star has had her body divided up as though it’s just a piece of meat, without a brain or personality or feelings. We imagine it’s one in the eye for sexists and animal haters everywhere. Well done PETA.

Meanwhile, Pam’s not the only woman who should probably know better who has stripped off to make a point. Pasty ginger lovely Julianne Moore has also derobed and got butt-ass nekkid for some worthy campaign or other.

No, hang on, it turns out she’s bigging up the cause of handbags by posing with some baby lions. We’re not sure if the bags are made from the lions or if you’re meant to keep the lions in the bag but well done Julianne anyway.

Let’s hope the trend doesn’t spread to the UK and we’re forced to look at a picture of Anne Diamond breast-feedding an ocelot for Oxfam or something.