Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Apathy, Attitude & Aptitude, Audi, Brand Suicide, Communication Strategy, Corporate Evil, Crap Products In History, Creativity, Cunning, Customer Service, Delusion, Devious Strategy, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Membership
Day 3 of this blog in 2025 and it’s like I’m as pissy as 2006.
You see one of the things I find hilarious is when companies talk about ‘customer service’. The reason I laugh is the ones who talk about it the most, tend to be the ones who care the least.
Oh they don’t say that of course, it’s just they seem to be of the belief that if they say a lot about it, it doesn’t require them to actually do anything with it.
Kind of like the experts on Linkedin, hahaha.
Anyway, recently I came across a phenomenal example of this behaviour.
Phenomenal in so much as the hypocrisy of their actions suggest they’re either utterly stupid, or literally don’t give a shit.
Let me give you a bit of background.
A week after I bought my new car, some fucker did this to it.
Claimed his brakes had failed, despite the fact you can see he was looking at his phone.
He then added to the bullshit by giving me a false address and number – but sadly for him, I had a dash-cam, that not only showed his rego, but proved he was in the wrong.
Anyway, that all has been sorted out … however before the insurance company took it to the garage to be repaired, I wanted to ensure I was on top of all the damage he’d caused so I bought a device that ‘diagnoses’ how the car is performing.
Basically you plug it in and it reads the data of the car to identify how it operates.
Normally I wouldn’t bother with such things, but given the car was only a week old, I wanted to ensure everyone knew what had to be fixed.
So I went on website of this company, chose the device specifically for my car, paid for it – and the subscription – and waited. A week or so later it arrived and I plugged it into my car only to be told it was the wrong one and that I needed a newer version with a subscription to access the information.
Given I had literally ordered – and paid for – the latest model from their website, this was somewhat of a suprise, so I wrote to the company to ask for help in sorting it out.
This was the ‘reply’ I received …
What the absolute fuck?
I mean … how many things can one company get in one email response?
Or should I say, how many contradictory answers can one company write in one email response.
First of all they say the ‘ticket is closed’, despite not actually responding to my question.
Then they say they ‘regret’ I can’t send them a reply to their email … despite the fact the top line of their email states ‘please type your reply above the line’.
Then, to rub things in – or confuse me further – they say they’re happy to assist me anytime, despite the fact they’ve literally not assisted me and worse, have blatantly gaslit me.
I am almost impressed at how much they obviously don’t give a shit.
They’re almost Trump-esque in their deliberate avoidance and ignorance.
It’s laughable given this company is supposedly the creator of a product that tells you things no one else will say. What a shame they don’t practice what they preach. But then, so many companies think ‘truth’ is optional.
So to the people at Carly …
Your product sucks.
Your service sucks.
Your system sucks.
And you suck.
Because as bad my car was hit, the damage is nowhere near as bad as the damage you’ve done to one of your paying customers. A paying customer who will not only never give you a penny ever again, but who has – like the petty little shit I am – found a way to teach Carly’s CEO, Mr Avid Avini, a lesson he will hopefully never forget.
Or should I say, a lesson he may never be able to stop.
Hey, he started it.
Cue: Evil Laugh.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Alcohol, Attitude & Aptitude, Brand Suicide, Brands, Communication Strategy, Crap Campaigns In History, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Delusion, Devious Strategy, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Mediocrity
Day 2 of 2025 and I’m still bursting with positive pessimism.
Helped because of stuff like this the following …
We all know one of the key roles of advertising is to add commercial momentum and value to business. Well, I recently saw a rather unique approach to achieving this goal with some work from vodka brand, Smirnoff.
Have a look at this.
What the absolute fuck?
What the hell is that copy?
What does it mean? What were they thinking? How the hell did this get approved?
I appreciate being associated with Russia these days is commercial suicide, but seriously, having Putin as their brand ambassador would be less shameful than this horror show.
And the overt attempt to boost business by attempting to be seen as a ‘social lubricant’ is about as subtle as a cucumber down a pair of cycling shorts.
“Don’t drink alone, drink with lots of people” … they scream.
To which I reply, why?
Why the hell should I?
And why the hell should it be with Smirnoff.
If you want to do that, how about you do something that creates the conditions that make me want to do it. Make it easy for me to do it.
But then, if you did that, it would mess up your ‘please drink responsibly’ message that you use to lobby governments to give you tax breaks because you’re more worried about the impact of declining alcohol sales and consumption than you are about excessive drinking.
Maybe. Ahem.
I’ve always felt Smirnoff – bar a couple of campaigns a 1000 years ago – have had a problem capturing and expressing who they are., but this is new depths of barrel scraping awful.
That said, I appreciate there’s also the possibility it could be an act of creative genius.
I appreciate those are wildly contrasting views, but it’s because I can’t tell if this ad is:
1. The result of the copywriter chugging down copious amounts of Smirnoff as they ‘wrote’ the headline. OR …
2. It has been purposefully designed to be so insane, it will make all who see it want to turn to drink and so Smirnoff sales rise.
Frankly, I can’t help but feel they’d have more luck with this ad if they targeted Pornhub’s audience, because ‘YOU DO YOU … NEEDS MORE US … WE DO US’ sounds more like an invitation to a swingers party than anything that would make anyone else give a damn.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, Brand, Brand Suicide, Brilliant Marketing Ideas In History, Comment, Communication Strategy, Confidence, Context, Crap Marketing Ideas From History!, Creativity, Culture, Devious Strategy, Differentiation, Effectiveness, Entertainment, Happiness, Innovation, Luxury, Mischief, Packaging, Planning, Professionalism, Relevance, Resonance, Strategy
This is the last post for a week because I’m off again.
I know … I know … it’s getting ridiculous, but consider my jet-lag, your mental health.
Talking of mental health … I’ve not had a drop of alcohol for 38 years.
THIRTY EIGHT.
But despite that, I do find myself buying it on occasion … mainly when those occasions are an extremely rare dinner invite and/or a desire to show gratitude towards someone in particular.
And when that happens, I remind myself how easily influenced I can be.
Because as we saw in 2007, my biggest motivator is the packaging rather than the quality of the product.
Well, I say that, but it has to be a brand I’ve at least heard of – a brand I associate with some sort of quality – but fundamentally, it’s all about the packaging.
Recently I wanted to get something for our old neighbour in LA.
It was his birthday … he’s an amazing human … and he invited me to his dinner. [I was in town, so it wasn’t some totally empty gesture]
So I rushed to a bottle shop and was immediately hit with a wealth of choices and options and so what did I end up choosing?
This.
Yep, a bottle of Veuve in a pseudo orange SMEG fridge.
Frankly it looked ridiculous … hell, it is ridiculous … but it’s also my kind of ridiculous, despite even my low-class tastes thought that for 2 brands that are supposedly ‘premium’, the way they combined looked cheap and tragic.
But unsuprisingly, my inner Dolly ‘it-costs-a-lot-of-money-to-look-this-cheap’ Parton, took over and I handed over my cash and walked out full of smugness and slight humiliation.
Now I don’t know the background to this collab.
I don’t know the process they took to get here,
And while on one level it makes some-sort-of-sense, it also is completely and utterly bonkers … and that’s why I love it.
Because in a world of sensible, it’s nice to see ridiculous win.
Yes, I appreciate Apple’s ‘ceremony of purchase’ packaging strategy is next level … but in terms of what I call, ‘social luxury’, the use of ridiculous packaging – as seen in the fragrance industry – is arguably, the most sensible thing they can do.
For all the processes, models and eco-systems being pushed by so many people right now, it’s interesting how few actively encourage searching for the weird edges. Ironically, they build approaches where the aim is to filter these out before they even have a chance to see what they can do. Which is why as much as the we laugh at the superficiality of fragrance companies and some alcohol brands, they can teach us more about standing out than all these models that seem obsessed with making sure we all ‘fit in’.
So who are the stupid ones now eh?
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, Communication Strategy, Creativity, Devious Strategy, Experience, Food, Marketing, Packaging
I’ve always been fascinated by the art of the upsell.
The ways different companies attempt to psychologically increase the average order size of their customers.
One of the most famous is McDonald’s … who basically have kept the classic ‘small, medium and large’ sizes but over the years, have changed the volume of what each represents. So what is now McDonald’s ‘small’ was once McDonald’s large, meaning they get more liquid into their customers mouths, even if the customer is continually buying the ‘same size’.
But where I get the most intrigued is how companies label their small, medium and large sizes.
That doesn’t have to always be in terms of portion size, but also proposal.
One of the most common approaches is ‘Gold, Silver and Bronze’.
Even though the intention is so transparent, it is amazing how often it works because ultimately, the goal is to upsell people from bronze than downgrade people from Gold.
But the best one’s tend to be in Asia – where they tap into all manner of cues to influence the decision making process.
One of my favourites – if that’s the right word – was this Valentine’s Day ad in Hong Kong from years back.
Positioning the ‘wife’ as worthy of only the smallest sized jewellery and the mistress the largest – with mothers in-between – was definitely a unique approach. Though arguably, it may also have been the most honest given the proliferation of mistresses in certain parts of Asia.
But recently I was in Chengdu airport and I saw a worthy new competitor. This.
Vintage, Rare, Precious is all kinds of genius.
Because unlike other approaches, you don’t feel you’re being a complete cheap bastard regardless what version you buy.
Of course, that could also be seen as a flaw, however given in China, everyone knows everything you do says something about you – and the underlying message of these options is old, limited edition and show-off – I think it works in ways other approaches can only dream of.
Which means, as often is the case, China leads the way and maybe … just maybe … Western companies and brands could start giving them credit for stuff they’ve been doing longer than we have been a civilisation.
[Which I covered off years ago in Sydney when I spoke at the Mumbrella conference. You can be bored by watching parts 1, 2, 3 and 4 here]
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Ambition, Aspiration, Attitude & Aptitude, Audacious, Brand, Brand Suicide, Brilliant Marketing Ideas In History, Cannes, Collaboration, Comment, Confidence, Context, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Devious Strategy, Differentiation, Distinction, Emotion, Fast Food, Food, IMU, Innovation, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Packaging, Paula, Planners, Provocative, Qantas, Relationships, Relevance, Reputation, Resonance, Smell
Over the years, I’ve written a lot about collabs.
The good.
The bad.
The ridiculous.
But recently there has been one that has somehow achieved all three. AT ONCE.
That’s right, the glorious, overpowering flavor of Pickled Onion Monster Munch and Heinz mayo.
It’s the combination no one asked for … no one expected and no one imagined could work.
And it doesn’t, and yet it does.
It’s possible the unhealthiest and most unpleasant thing you could ever put in your mouth and yet – if you’re like me – and love Monster Munch, it’s something you could not possibly resist from trying.
Hell, when we moved to London back in 2018, it was literally the first ‘British’ food item I got Otis to try – literally the morning after we arrived – and the fact he liked them [at least he did, then] made me burst with so much pride, I could overlook his development of an American accent. Just. Check it out below..
But here’s the thing, similar to when the Absolut Disco Ball packaging made me buy alcohol, despite having not drunk anything since I was FIFTEEN YEARS OLD, this collab made me go to absolute lengths to get it into my hands.
You see you couldn’t buy it in NZ so I had to adopt different means.
I wrote to Heinz.
I joined their ‘fan club/DTC’ service.
I explored supermarkets in both America and Australia.
I contacted courier services about getting it and delivering it to me.
In the end, a plea on social media was answered by the incredible thoughtful Jestyn on Twitter/X … who not only got it for me, but sent it to me as well.
And while I would not get it again … the fact is I was not only more excited about it than 99% of brands out there, but I went to greater lengths to get my hands on it than I would for 99% of brands despite the fact I knew it was overtly bad for you and I’m Mr Healthy these days so I was perfectly aware that I’d only ever taste it once.
While there are many possible lessons we could learn from the creation of this, albeit, novelty product – be if fandom, communities or unexpected relevance – the real lesson is to follow, and then protect, the excitement.
The stuff that captures the imagination.
The stuff that changes the conversation.
The stuff that keeps people on their toes.
The stuff everyone keeps referring back to, even when logic tells them not to.
Because as Paula, Martin and I explained at our Strategy Is Constipated, Imagination Is The Laxative talk at Cannes back in 2023 … the greatest strategy doesn’t start from a place of logic, it finds the point of most excitement and works back from there.