Ads of the Weird : Alcohol

This time, Heineken shares a good commercial

Allison Linn — Tue, 06 May 2008 07:00:00 GMT

Heineken was rightly chided last fall for producing a commercial that managed to be stupid, sexist and an assault on our eardrums -- quite a feat considering the strong competition for such honors in the lowbrow world of beer advertising.

But now, the beer company is redeeming itself. Heineken Premium Light’s "Share the Good" commercial may not be the most original idea, but the execution is a fun, refreshing break from your standard American beer commercial (twentysomething guys goof off in some beer-related way; insert logo here).

Heineken’s commercial begins with a hipster walking across the desert to deliver a beer to a couple in a hot tub. Next, the couple is giving a beer to a young woman, who traipses through the snow to give the beer to a bearded cabin dweller with an excellent laugh, who then goes on to an Indian celebration, and so on.

Heineken

Heineken is far from the first company to capitalize on instant globetrotting, multiculturalism or the pleasures of sharing with strangers. But, thanks to smart casting and an insanely catchy song by Chris Knox, they manage to do it better than a lot of their competitors.

In this cynical era in which backstabbing your friends, celebrating your selfishness and subjecting people degrading high jinks are usually played for laughs, it’s actually pretty risky to trot out a commercial that rejoices, with no trace of irony, in a "We Are the World" world. That’s especially true when the reminder that sharing is good -- something many people forget after they leave preschool -- is being used as a hook to sell beer.

And that may be the ad’s Achilles heel. While the commercial is fun to watch and nice to listen to, it’s easy to forget that the company is hawking middle-of-the-road beer. We like seeing ballerinas and barflies make an unlikely connection, but we’re not sure either is a Heineken drinker.

Click here to see the TV ad directly, or click here for the whole campaign.

Colt .45 brown bags it

Rob Neill — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 08:00:00 GMT

We are no fans of malt liquor. Not to say we haven’t drank our share.

But when we were young and dumb and poor (aka college), it was the low-budget alternative to something good. Now that we’re no longer … er … young, we’ve refined our cocktail hour habits.

So we were mildly surprised to find the makers of Colt .45 trying to make what is essentially cheap swill fashionable.

Pabst Brewing Co.

Pabst Brewing Co.’s new print and Web campaign uses the works of comic book artist Jim Mahfood (nice touch: he had previously founded 40 Oz. Comics) and attempts to take the brand out of the hood and move it to the … gentrified lofts up the street in, well, that same hood.

Screw mojitos urban hipsters! Here’s your new drink of choice!

We’re not going to debate the merits of alcohol advertising. It’s a legal product after all. But we are amused at some of the more cynical elements of the campaign. We’ll attempt to translate.

The pitch: “Our brewmasters use words like ‘Smooth but robust,’ ‘flavorful extracts of malted barley and corn’ and ‘ample body and smooth finish’ to describe the brew. Sounds good to us. And for a little extra kick, try the double malt.”

What it means: This tastes like crap, so get the higher alcohol version – at least you’ll be immune to the taste quicker.

The pitch: “Everyone’s had a Colt .45 night. It’s the kind where anything goes, from dusk ‘til the break of dawn.”

What it means: Bring bail money and don’t try to fight cops while handcuffed.

That said, Mahfood’s cartoons on the Web site (check “The Tales” section) are funny. The 12-pack-hidden-in-the-afro one, especially, ranks right up there with Bud light for beer-ad-goodness. And having it all look like it was drawn on brown paper bags not only made us think of a fave Public Enemy song, but it makes the campaign seem more edgy.

So great campaign for a lame product. Seems fitting during this endless political season after all.

It’s still not our favorite malt liquor. This is.

Enjoy the Super Bowl, we have commentary already on the ads here, and will have more news and video of the ads later in the week.

Heineken’s future shocks

Rob Neill — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 07:00:00 GMT

It’s Halloween, and that means two things: Creepy stuff and beer.

We’ve been meaning to write about this one for a while, but work kept getting in the way. Noticed it a couple of months ago, and our first reaction was “er … that’s kind of weird.”

Who knew that at the same time one columnist was calling it the most sexist beer commercial ever produced? Which, since it’s a beer commercial, pretty much means it’s the most sexist commercial ever produced. (Even though said writer pretty much knocks himself off his perch by telling a sexist joke.)

Heineken

The commercial begins with bad techno music (we’re sorry, redundant we know) and a woman robotically walking across a stage. Then her minidress opens to reveal … a minikeg. Actually it's Heineken’s portable DraftKeg, which their Web site informs us holds 10 pints (or, as we referred to it in college, “brunch”) for up to 30 days (or, as we referred to it in college, “roughly 30 times the amount of time that much beer would last in the apartment.”)

But wait, there’s more. Upon release (birth?) of the keg she grows another set of arms and proceeds to serve up a cold one. She then clones herself twice.

Sexist? Probably. Objectifying women? Probably not any more so than any other beer ad.

We won’t be buying any Heineken any time soon, but that has far more to do with their actual product than how they promote it.

Off topic: We understand where this Roomba pitch is coming from. Unfortunately.

“Mad Men” revels in 1960, and Jack Daniel’s

Allison Linn — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 04:30:00 GMT

“Mad Men,” a new TV show about an advertising firm from cable network AMC, is set in 1960 amid a haze of smoke and booze that’s meant to reinforce the authenticity of the series.

The retro atmosphere also provides a convenient foil for pitching Jack Daniel’s, whose sponsorship of the 13-episode first season includes plans to feature the brand by name in three forthcoming episodes.

Yet you won’t hear the words “Jack Daniel’s” in the first episode, which premieres Thursday. Instead, unlabeled bottles of brown liquid adorn every office credenza, and when the characters are done drinking in their offices they head out to a favorite watering hole to order more of the same.

AMCTV

Arlene Manos, president of national advertising sales for AMC parent Rainbow Media, said the Jack Daniel’s sponsorship was a natural because drinking whiskey was so common in the early 1960s era. But while the show actively pursued the sponsorship, they didn’t want the product placement to overwhelm it.

“If we had one in every episode, that would be too much,” she said.

In an age when more and more people are using digital video recorders to skip those pesky commercials, it’s not surprising that a company like Jack Daniel’s would want to build its brand into the actual show. Elsewhere, everything from car brands to soda cans are popping up in television shows with increasing frequency.

The surprising part is that a company would want to promote itself through the characters in “Mad Men.”

Great television is filled with men and women who are morally questionable yet charismatic – you may not want to live Tony Soprano’s life, but you might well copy his drink order.

In “Mad Men,” the character who is supposed to be most sympathetic can ask a prospective client why she didn’t choose an ad firm with more people like herself (read: Jews), and then storm out of a meeting after telling her that he won’t let a woman talk to him like she did. Later, by way of apology, he’ll take her out for a drink and ask her why she doesn’t do something really fulfilling: get married and make babies. Apparently, in 1960, none of this was enough to lose the possible account.

The show’s characters are so one-dimensionally distasteful, and so eager to embrace the sexism and bigotry of the era at the expense, even, of an engrossing plot, that it’s hard to find anything alluring about them.

Click here for show details.

Office party parody

Allison Linn — Tue, 03 Jul 2007 08:59:00 GMT

Cubicle culture is always rife with humorous potential, and beer maker Anheuser-Busch is the latest company to try to mine it for the type of ad that will, well, get people talking over the cubicles.

The spot begins with a woman explaining to one of her colleagues that they’ve started charging people a quarter each time they swear.

“Who gets the money?” the colleague asks warily

“I don’t know. We’ll use it buy something for the office, like a case of Bud Light or something,” she responds.

You can guess what happens next.

Budweiser

Instead of cutting down on swearing, everyone starts trying to find an excuse for an expletive, even chastising those that don’t punctuate a sentence with a payment-inducing phrase.

The ad’s charm is in the funny way that people work swearing into boring workplace conversation, and the juxtaposition of that with the stereotypically drab office environs. Even the final shot, in which everyone celebrates with the Bud Light, has that awkward office party feel that makes you chuckle knowingly.

Bob Lachky, chief creative officer for Anheuser-Busch, said the company has actually had the ad since late 2006, but didn’t know quite what to do with it. The content was deemed too edgy for television, but it didn’t have an obvious home on the Web or elsewhere until the company decided to put it on its bud.tv site a few weeks ago.

Lachky said Web response has been strong, but that doesn’t mean the company is tempted to try for TV after all.

“I just don’t think that Bud Light needs to put something too risky on television,” Lachky said. “I mean, every time we dabble there, right on the edge, we hear about it.”

Watch the ad here.