Archive for February, 2012

My next blog will be all about why I am closing all of my accounts at Wells Fargo.  They are stuck in the 20th century in so many ways it’s hard to believe they are still in business.

But before I get to that, I have some ideas for the Department of Licensing, and my bet is that this applies to most states, not just my home, and current, state of Washington.   My first such Driver’s License from that state is pictured to the left from 1982.

As much as I dread the notion of getting back in line at the DOL to renew a license, I have to give them a lot of credit – I just renewed my license online and that was fast and easy.

And even though the long lines are awful, I will give the state of Washington (and any other state that does this) some credit for the simplicity of their method of establishing whether someone is old enough to drink (helping bars and vendors that sell alcohol).  In Washington, you are not allowed to look into the camera until you are 21, so a bar or vendor doesn’t have to look at your birthday and do the math to see if you can buy alcohol, all they have to do is look at your photo.  Good thinking.

It does crack me up a bit that the way they could be sure it was an authentic license in 1982 was putting grooves in the orange section in the shape of the state of Washington so that when you tilted it back and forth in the light, the grooves would move like waves.  Wow. How low-tech can you get, by modern standards?

I am a little bit surprised they don’t need a more current photo, but unlike my 1982 photo, the photo they took of me in 2007 is pretty much what I look like today.

So when I mentioned it in passing to my friend Mary that I am so delighted to not have to  go to the DOL to renew this year, her reaction surprised me.  She said, “oh I know, so you don’t get the judgemental looks about whether you really weigh what you say you weigh.” Nope.  That’s not why. I really just don’t like standing in line for hours.

But it did get me rethinking.

What if they had a scale at the DOL that you had to use to verify your weight unless you paid a fee to waive the weigh-in?  Or the photo, for that matter.  Think about how much revenue states would generate if people (probably mostly women) could pay to fib on non-crucial details of their license.  Let’s face it, women can wear their hair differently and become unrecognizable, what good is that photo anyway?  Really.

There are 6.6 million people in Washington (presumbly about half are women).  Obviously a lot of women in their 20′s couldn’t care less about whether it’s their real weight, but after that, who knows.  If you charge $30 just for the waiver on the weigh-in, that’s upwards of $100 million (over five years) in additional revenue, and probably another $100 million to pay to re-use the same photo from last time.  And if they wanted to charge $50 for a professional photographer to take your photo .  . . Well, you get the idea.

Free money for states that need it.  Why not?

-Ric

THE BEST

The hands down best superbowl ad was the Audi vampire spot (click here).  I had seen an advertisement in print form for the new Audi A7, touting its new headlights as being the closest thing to simulated daylight ever, and thought that was interesting enough.  But to then marry that idea with the curent runaway popularity of, and fascination with, vampires was absolutely brilliant – with the idea that the driver unknowingly is about to kill all of his friends at the party because vampires can’t survive daylight. . .  Love it.  Not only great rethinking on the headlights, but to hang it on the coattails of something so edgy as vampires, with just the right tone, really well done.

Then Honda really hit a home run with its CR-V ad (here). Knowing that it needs to target the baby boomer generation with ads, getting Matthew Broderick to reprise his role in Ferris Beuller’s Day Off was probably not a bad idea for anyone, but to align it with its current marketing emphasis on spending time away, this really hit the nail on the head for them.  So while Audi reached into the what’s hot today, Honda reached back to what was hot when baby boomers were kids to get something to resonate with them.

Downy Unstoppables, here, did something a bit lot Honda in going back to the past, getting Mean Joe Green to to a repeat of his  Coke commercial from the ’70s (here) and it’s funny enough, especially if you are a fan of Amy Sedaris, but it seems to be off the mark in terms of target.  I don’t think people watching the superbowl want to hear about laundry.

Acura (full length and very funny version here) missed the mark in a similar way with it’s spot with Jerry Seinfeld.  While it’s true Seinfeld and Leno are famous for their love of cars, I just don’t buy that they would care about an Acura.  I can’t get there.  I thought Hyundai made the same mistake (here) with its cheetah spot – very clever, funny, and memorable, but I still think a Prius is faster zero to 60.  I’m just sayin.

OK those are the best ads, even if a bit off target.

THE WORST

The worst one was the Chevy end of the world ad (here). I was with them through the entire thing, and even thought the Twinkies were a funny ending, but to suggest that their buddy didn’t survive the apocolypse because he was in a Ford broke one of the basic rules of the game.  You never name your competition in a negative way, and suggesting that your competition is why one of your buddies is dead?  Ugh.

GoDaddy was also pretty bad.

Overall winner – Audi.  No question.

-Ric

I haven’t blogged for a little while because I hadn’t seen any really great evidence of rethinking worth writing about.   Then I read this article by Andrew Adam Newman, and WOW!

I do think Newman fails to mention what seems to me as the biggest point of all – which I will get to.  The good news is that someone involved with marketing at P&G really gets the cultural change that has already happened, that will continue to happen and they have taken advantage of it in a great, great way.

But before I get to that, I have to bring up something on the opposite end of the spectrum that is evidence that someone involved with marketing at Restoration Hardware is way, way, way out of touch.  Last year I got their Fall catalogue, which by itself is notable because I don’t get many catalogues because I do most of my shopping in person or through Amazon.  I have been into a Restoration Hardware, but I don’t shop there, so it’s already a waste of at least the two dollars it costs to send a piece of first class mail to someone (all in costs from paper, postage, transportation, ink, etc. – just ask Steve Shivers over at doxo). Then I picked it up and opened it.  Very dark photographs of a lot of things I have no need for.  And as if that’s not enough – the catalogue was 615 pages long (see photo).  I immediately pictured a fleet of US Postal Service making a special run, loaded up with these catalogues that weigh a lot.  What a spectacular waste of money.  If they feel really need to do a catalogue, call the people at ZMAGS and make it digital (and add some color to the photos).  I am still not going to read it, but at least they won’t be wasting so much money. 

Back to P&G.

I love the idea of an ad interrupting another ad with a completely unrelated product (though both owned by P&G, at the risk of stating the obvious).  That’s awesome, and the beauty is that it’s totally brand aligned with the Old Spice campaign of late with Terry Crews (there’s a very funny compilation video of him out on YouTube and here).    I will admit I had not previously heard of Charmin Fresh Mates, but the idea is pretty simple and might even be more eco-friendly.  The really big point that wasn’t mentioned in the article was the cultural change that it reflects.  Two, actually.  First of all, short summaries of things (like news headlines) are not new, and in some circles there is a special word, other than blurb, which is “squib” for that short summary.  What is relatively new, fed largely by Twitter, is the need to express things with very little time or space in which to express them – the tweet.  The other thing that is also not new, but is far more prevalent in our culture is the interruption.  Text messages interrupting meeting discussions, e-mails interrupting work on a document – we are getting interrupted all day long now.  This P&G move is a combination of the two in a very elegant way – the 30 second ad spot is so 27 seconds ago  . . . it’s too long.  P&G only needs half the time to, in effect “Tweet”  their ad, so the interruption happens after they have delivered their message and they can deliver another message in the remaining time.  Awesome.

Future blogs will be about why ivivva is so smart for Lululemon Athletica, and why the virtual goods business, think Zynga, is such a big deal for other industries.  Stay tuned.

-Ric