Every time I look at this ad for BMW's selection of "Premium Used Cars", I just can't believe my eyes. (hat tip to Copyranter, where I found the ad)
HELLO? Is there anyone home at BMW Marketing...?
The questions that keep popping up (please do excuse the pun in this case) in my mind are:
WHO THE HELL SIGNED OFF ON THIS AT BMW?
a) Is this guy really in marketing?
b) How many of his brain cells were actively participating in helping him make the decision on this one?
WHO IS THE CREATIVE GOFER THAT DELIVERED THIS LITTLE PIECE OF MENTAL MASTURBATION?
Do they really pay him at BBDO Greece? And was there no-one more strategic to review this concept?
In my opinion this ad is the perfect example of "how stupid ads are made". The answer? One long chain of unbelievably short-sighted decisions made by people who really shouldn't be paid to be in marketing or advertising.
The last person to leave the BMW marketing team, please: switch off the lights.
Friday
Wanted: second-hand woman for sheer driving pleasure
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
20 comments:
OMG!!! I am looking at this ad and it's too outrageous to believe! WTF??? WHY isn't the entire world up in arms... why did Mylie Cyrus's ad get so much bad press, but THIS...THIS CLEARLY provocative and tastless ad - doesn't create a peep? Let's stir the pot, shall we?
Looks to me like marketing to men at its most lazy - not only alienating women who may have been potential BMW buyers (and there have got to be a good number of those), but riling so many female bloggers in the marketing field, and beyond, that it will surely become a "negative influence of bloggers" case study. Whoops.
Consider this....
If you pay attention to the ad and create a media frenzy, BMW will get what they want... lots of people talking about BMW. Whether the pub is good or bad, BMW doesn't really care. It gets folks to think about BMW.
Obviously, the ad will not create a buying frenzy of BMWs by women. Nor will it attract men to BMW because it does not align with how men think.
Without the negative pub, the ad really tells the world... don't buy a BMW. It might be best to leave it at that.
I feel like a dirty old man looking at this ad.
And I am a 35 year old woman.
So, depending on this models age, this is incestual, abusive and mental rape of a "girl," not "woman" (still not okay of a woman!) under 18? 17? 16? 15? ACK!
Are they scraping the bottom of the barrel for a reason? "Hard" times at BMW??! Huh.
Vomit. I will never buy a BMW, no matter how rich I get.
Classless advertising for a luxury brand.
Ugh. It is rather alienating. The cars are great, but that ad is disgusting.
Is she even supposed to be "legal"? She looks like she's 14.
The strangest thing to me is that when I first looked at the ad, I immediately put myself into the place of the girl and I didn't understand the ad at all, even coming at it through the portal of "here's an offensive ad." I thought, "Not the first to what?" I was trying to figure out what she was looking at that she wasn't the first to do.
Does anyone know if the ad was ever publicly diplayed (print, bill-boards or whatever) anywhere?
Wow. I certainly hope this never saw daylight. Aside from the age of the model, that caption is offensive.
Did this ad actually run? I've never saw it - which doesn't say much given what I read. But that is one offensive ad. It turns off women. And I can't imaging it is attractive to men - I thought they didn't like sloppy seconds (sorry to be gross). And who the hell decided a 14 year old was a good model for this ad anyway?
You have got to be kidding me? I hope to hell they put a stop to this type of ad. Are they looking to loose female buyers? What does this ad have to do with a BMW?
Makes me sick.
This is a deliberate attempt at "buzz" marketing. There's no way this ad got into print without malice of forethought.
Mission accomplished. People are talking.
it's not that big of a deal. get over it.
I fought this battle in the '70s when I taught newswriting at Temple University Center City. I had a HUGE collection of obnoxious ads and articles (including from The Wall Street Journal) portraying women.
Why must this battle be fought again? But with social media networks today perhaps pressure can be put on BMW much faster than in the '70s.
Besides all the other crap, it's pretty ridiculous to place a 14-year-old girl in the role of a 2nd hand woman. Just when, exactly, did she have time to get to "second-hand?"
The ad may be sexist and distasteful to me (and many others here) but...
(1) It was probably meant to be provocative (remember the Benetton United Colors ads?)
(2) It's not accidental; it says a lot about BMW's target clientele...
(3) With that clientele in mind, it probably works! (unfortunately)
I'm confused about what exactly is "sexist"? A woman (admittedly a young looking woman) has sex with more than one person and that's sexism?
It doesn't make me want to buy a car but it isn't THAT terrible. At least she's not cleaning the car.
Clearly not BMW's best work...
A high performance, premium brand doesn't need parlor tricks to sell to the guys that are already buying the cars.
Someone didn't get the memo...
HEY! Wait a second...that's my daughter...?!?!(j/k)
I'm sorry, but this ad DOES appeal to men... if it's an actual ad, it draws a very funny parallel between how men look at cars AND women. They like the way they look and feel, even if 'they're not the first'. The feelings one has if one finds oneself in bed with such a woman at 5 in the morning are quite similar to one's feelings when spending too much money on a fast car: you've been seduced, you know it and you like it! If it's a joke, it's certainly a kind of humour that appeals to car-enthusiast men... I've sent it to some BMW driving friends already! PS Don't forget that the woman in this ad is portreyed as being very powerful: she's seduced the man into doing something he knows he really shouldn't... and she knows it.
Post a Comment