Showing 1 - 10 of 139 posts found matching: advertising

In news shocking to all Baby Boomers and younger, it has been widely reported that current manufacturer Ferrara Candy has decided to discontinue Fruit Stripe Gum, thereby once-and-for-all answering the question: no, we will not still feed you when we are 64.

Sixty-four years is a long time, but Ferrara Candy has only been selling Fruit Stripe for a small fraction of that time. Prior to 2012, Ferrara Candy was known as Farley & Sathers Candy, which itself was only founded in 2002 and bought the pre-existing Fruit Stripe brand from Hershey Foods in 2003. Hershey only had Fruit Stripe for about a year; they bought it in 2001 from Nabisco, which had acquired it in a 1981 merger with E.R. Squibb Company, which got their hands on it in a 1968 merger with Beech-Nut Life Savers who had introduced it in 1960.

(For more fun information on American corporation brand hi-jinks through history, I encourage you to visit the online archive of the United States Patent and Trademark Office, which retired their old TESS [Trademark Electronic Search System] last year for a more modern and easier to use but less acronymically friendly "cloud-based trademark search system" [CBTSS? Blech.] )

As has been the trend in recent beloved-but-unprofitable food brands being killed off by one corporate parent only to spring back to life under another (see: Hostess Twinkies and Necco Wafters), I expect that this media brouhaha will lead to continued life for Fruit Stripe. In fact, as of January 10, there is already a pending request at the US Patent Office for a new trademark just registered by Iconic Candies, a company dedicated to continuing discontinued "classic brands" like Bar None (discontinued by Hershey in 1997) and Creme Savers (discontinued by M&M/Mars in 2011).

Anyway, while we await zombie Fruit Stripe's inevitable return, in tribute to its nostalgic greatness, I offer a page from my personal comic book collection in which I demonstrated my 4-year-old's love of brightly artificial-colored, briefly artificially-flavored chewing gum by helping brand mascot Yipes the zebra navigate a maze of marketing Q&As.

I remember really loving the colorful zebra stripes more than the actual gum
from The Friendly Ghost, Casper, July 1980, No. 211

(Disclaimer: I might have cheated.)

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Watching football this week, I saw a commercial promoting the an upcoming Aquaman movie trailer. That's literally a commercial for a commercial.

Meanwhile, McDonald's has taken to airing commercials featuring movie clips that feature McDonald's product placement, in other words a commercial featuring other commercials.

As loathe as I am to give any attention to a Coca-Cola competitor, the highlight of the televised NFL opening weekend was easily this Frito-Lay ad (title: "Unretirement") featuring a handful of washed-up NFL has-beens... plus Dan Marino.

Football is a young Dan's game

Just throw it deep

Official NFL licensed cheaters

Nothing sells potato chips like a little memento mori.

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I often say that I'm completely impervious to advertising. I'm too intelligent and too set in my ways to fall for such blatant manipulation.

And then came this.


https://youtu.be/yOOb52AJOzo

I got as far as the keytar, and I immediately ordered a dozen pairs of women's soccer shoes.

Seriously though. If someone ever made a video like this about me, I would have it playing on every television in my house until I died. And then I would find a way to have it play on my tombstone.

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It's a fact of life in the smartphone age that advertisers have gotten so good at anticipating your future purchases, they'll send you ads for diapers before you even realize you're pregnant.

So I probably shouldn't be too quick to dismiss this ad I got earlier today:

Judah is a lion's whelp; from the prey, my son, you have gone up. He crouches down, he stretches out like a lion, like a lioness—who dares rouse him up?

So I guess I love baseball, cheerleaders, constipated hookers... and the Bible?

That makes me a true American! Thanks, Etsy!

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For the record, Georgia has now modified these stickers to add 'I voted securely'... because Republicans

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How'd that old commercial go? "You got chocolate in my Batman!"

I think what's possible is only limited by what you believe is possible, says the billionaire

I didn't know it when I picked this up at my local Fine Foods Store, but this is the third year Hershey's has produced a DC's Super Hero Bar. I think it's a fun idea, even if the candy itself doesn't really seem to understand how sequential art is supposed to work.

The panels are supposed to tell a story

This reminds me that back in art school in the 90s, I made a white chocolate candy bar in which each "panel" told a different chapter of my life-up-til-then story. I created a custom wrapper, too. I assure you, it looked better than it tasted.

By the way, don't miss out on International Batman Day 2022, which Warner Bros has decided is tomorrow, September 17. (It used to move around the calendar a lot, but this "holiday" seems to have settled into the third Saturday in September in recent years.) Celebrate it however you like.

Personally, Batman recommends chocolate.

nom, nom
Source: gifer.com

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Shaving cream.

For adult men.

To shave their manly faces.

Advertising dinosaurs.

Better buy Barbasol... or dinosaurs will eat you

For those who don't know, a fake Barbasol can containing dino DNA was a key element in the original Jurassic Park movie... and apparently the new Jurassic Park movie.

To celebrate, Barbasol has launched a sweepstakes in which the grand prize winner can choose to watch a movie or... go camping. Which, if you've ever actually watched a Jurassic Park movie, seems like the kind of prize that you may want to actually avoid.

But this is America, and Madison Avenue has never let a little thing like logic get in the way of a marketing opportunity.

So grab your razor and get cutting! The future of mankind may depend on it!

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Don't worry. Be happy.
advertisement from The Red And Black, November 23, 1945

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The Olympics are here again, which of course means that I'm watching fewer movies and more sports — just in time for the end of football season!

9/2018. Black Samson (1974)
The protagonist of this blaxploitation film has a pet lion that... doesn't ever do anything. Is it only here because the biblical Samson killed a lion? ("What is stronger than a lion? Black Samson!") More interestingly, although the film very much indulges in themes of black solidarity, the "white man" isn't really the bad guy here; that honor goes to one crazy, wannabe mafia boss who even the white men don't like. (Is Johnny Nappa a Philistine? Which of the girls dancing in Samson's topless bar is Delilah?) Hardly great cinema, but not entirely worthless, either.

10/2019. The Story of Three Loves (1953)
This anthology film lives up to its title, telling three different stories about lost loves is the good kind of weird. The middle chapter would appear to have inspired the movie Big (with Ricky Nelson in what would be Hanks' role), and the third chapter showcases Kirk Douglas' typical commitment to his roles, in this case as an obsessed trapeze artist.

11/2020. How to Build a Girl (2019)
Beanie Feldstein pretends to be young and English in the early 90s British music scene. As I've admitted before, I'm a sucker for coming-of-age films. This one hits all the usual beats, and of course I enjoyed it.

Drink Coke! (How to Build a Girl)
She orders a Coke in a bar, then never touches it. It just sits on that table. What is this, an SEC football press conference?

12/2021. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021)
Holy crap, the bus fight on this thing is amazing. They really should have found a way to make that the finale. I'd heard a lot of complaints about that CGI-driven finale, and I think they are all well deserved. The real problem isn't the CGI but the fact that the CGI characters introduced late in the third act have no character development before their action sequence. You've gotta give the audience a reason to care about your ridiculous animated dragons, Marvel, otherwise we're just checking our watches as we wait for the inevitable end-credit cameos.

13/2022. Putney Swope (1969)
The narrative is ostensibly about a no-nonsense outsider taking over a Madison Avenue advertising firm, but that's mostly just an excuse to satire consumerism, capitalism, socialism, racism, sexism, and, frankly, every -ism in all the best, most absurdist ways. Near the end of the film, there's a very self-indulgent several minutes of topless fight attendants which wouldn't be out of place in Kentucky Fried Movie but here comes across as appropriately damning of American society. As the man at the breakfast table eating Ethereal Cereal would say, "No shit!"

More to come.

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An elegant weapon for a more chivalrous age

Maybe. But the real question is can I fuck them?

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To be continued...

 

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