Once upon a time, endlines meant something.
They were distinct, explained a brands value or purpose.
And more often than not, were packed with personality.
Then Dan Wieden fucked it up for everyone.
You see his famous JUST DO IT became the benchmark for all brands.
Marketing Directors craved a line that summed up who they were in 3 words.
The number of words was more important than what it said … which is why you now get this …
What a pile of shite.
Bland, contrived, sameness …
Literally doing the opposite of what it is supposed to do.
Designed to appeal to the ego of the board rather than the hearts of the audience.
All because we have fallen into the trap of believing simplistic equates to effectiveness.
It doesn’t.
Simple might do … but simplistic is the lowest common denominator that requires zero thinking because it makes zero impression.
It’s why I sit here and can remember endlines from my childhood more easily than end lines I watched 10 minutes ago.
Handmade by Robots … for Fiat.
Refreshes the other parts other beers can’t reach … for Heineken.
Do you love someone enough to give them your last Rolo … for, ahem, Rolo.
Of course there’s a few modern endlines that work … GoPro’s ‘Be A Hero’ for example [though they went and fucked it up by changing it to utter blandom] … but in the main, companies seems to like endlines that sound like they know what they’re doing but don’t really say much at all.
At cynic we used to call these ‘Yoda Statements’, but what is even scarier is consultants are being paid a fortune to come up with this sort of twaddle.
That’s right, companies who claim to know how to help business grow are coming up with statements that literally make companies blend into everything else.
And yet they still are valued more highly by clients that companies who know how to push, provoke, inspire and capture the imagination of culture through creativity.
If anything tells you how mad the World is, surely one of them is that.