Beefin' 'bout the Duck
I got some static from a few of ya'll about hating on the Aflac duck. Again, I reiterate that he sucks. I mean, there must be a dozen commercials at this point with that bird, and they're ALL the same. Two people talk about what happens if they get hurt, the duck starts saying "Aflac," they don't hear him, and the duck eventually gets hurt (which is an OK part, actually) and then freaks out that same poor black dude. Man, that's genius. As a side note, does anyone else think it's weird that a fictional duck was the one people wanted removed from my plane o' death? There are actual humans on that plane, and a bird in a commercial is the one people are clamoring to save.
Anyway, what commercials DO I like? Well, I'll tell you.
The Burger King football commercials rock. That King mascot is a stroke of genius - the perfect amount of cheesiness and tongue-in-cheek humor. Seeing him intercept a pass and take it into the end zone cracks me up every time.
The Bacardi and Cola commercials are already classics in my book (yes, I have an extensive book on advertising - It's called "Buy this Crap: A Tribute to Clever Television Commercials." You can order it on Amazon or send $19.95 directly to me.) I love the Miami Vice theme, and these guys deserve their own movie. Who's dirty?
Promos for the Local News in Macon are always trippy. Seeing these punks flub the line "Tonight at 5" even though they record it every day reminds me why Middle Georgia is less advanced than Middle Earth.
Other than that, commercials suck and I thank the good folks at Cox Communications for my Tivo.
posted by Noba @ 9/26/2005 01:41:00 AM
3 comments
3 Comments:
when i first saw the burger king commercials i thought that i was having an acid flashback.
marshall
Dat AFLAC Duck is widely considered one of the best and most innovative ad campaigns of the last 20 years; I am not even kidding. As an advertising major, this was reinforced to me by my professors each class I took.
I am not denying it is annoying, but I tend to agree with them. Boring entities ie insurance companies have to do something outside the box in order to gain brand recognition. The duck (combined with relentless AFLAC trivia questions) have given AFLAC a strong brand name (as evidenced by its meteroric growth in the 90s). Geico, to a lesser extent has also been successful by following a similar advertising strategy.
Whatever ad agency (im pretty sure its BBDO, who also came up w/ the Apple 1984 and Wheres the Beef) came up w/ the AFLAC duck is genius.
I agree with you, Joe. It's certainly been a successful campaign for the company, or else it wouldn't have been such a long-running campaign. However, the Aflac commercials demonstrate a kind of dichotomy in successful advertising campaigns. The spots are going to be liked a lot by many, and hated as fervently by others. Typically, an advertiser would like to draw a primarily positive reaction at best, and the worst range of reactions would be ambivalence. Just as Aflac has surely tapped into a great consumer market with this campaign, it is likely to have turned just as many people off to their company indefinitely (I am in the latter group). I'm reminded of the Quizno's "We Love the Subs" campaign of about a year or two ago. I loved those singing creatures so much - they're still some of my favorite characters. Yet, we all know lots of people who couldn't bear to watch the little things. It's that stark disparity in consumer reactions that I think the Aflac duck spots elicit.
Regardless of the success of the campaign, it still doesn't change the fact that I hate that fuckin' duck. And on Noba 3:16, that's all that matters.
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