It seems to me that Pepsi hasn’t been able to launch a good ad campaign as of late. The last decent one I remember starred poor, old Ray Charles singing, “You got da right one, baby! Uh huh!” To this day I can’t listen to his music without thinking about that. Anyway, after that Pepsico hasn’t created a decent marketing campaign (recall the disturbingly sexual Britney Spears ad). Their latest campaign hasn’t broken from this pattern.
Pepsi is trying to market it’s extra-caffeintated soda Pepsi Max not as an energy drink, but as a diet drink. “One very very very lonely calorie” their images proudly display. How do they make that slogan stick? By throwing it into an amusing situation. What situation? Why, that lonely calorie keeps attempting suicide in each of the three new ads. Ha! I managed to get my hand on the images in case you don’t feel like clicking the link. Let’s check them out.
Ad #1
Here, our calorie is strapped to a bomb while cutting its wrists and consuming vast amounts of pills (although I don’t see pockets on him, so I don’t know where he kept them). On the side some… well, creature looks on nonchalantly. Hilarious.
Ad #2
Here, our hero has apparently strapped a stick of dynamite to his head, soaked himself in gasoline and is sitting under a precariously placed bucket of acid. Comedy gold. But wait, there’s more!
Ad #3
Our calorie attempting to hang himself while he shoots himself in the head. Look! You can even see a little bit of his brain coming out. Oh, and it seems he’s consumed poison, as well. And best of all, this jolly little beaver just gnaws away at teh stump unbeknownest to the calorie’s situation. See? It’s funny!
Except its not. Suicide is never funny. I don’t know why we have to keep reminding Madison Avenue and Hollywood that. However, whoever came up with this plan and implemented must be very morally confused, as is anyone who finds suicide to be funny. I don’t want to go onto a diatribe about the struggles the mentally ill face in our society as it is already and how much of a stigma mental illness is and that we don’t need any more negative images of us floating out their in the media ether, so I won’t. Instead, I’ll address the good people of PepsiCo directly.
You have failed as advertisers and as human beings. You have insulted me personally and every man, woman and child in America who has been affected by suicide. I will not use any PepsiCo product until the mentally ill community is given a sincere, proper apology.
I have already written PepsiCo to lodge my complaint. I urge anyone reading this to do likewise. Let them know what you think of their making light of suicide and that if they keep down this path, the only thing that is going to die is their brand integrity.
Posted in Marketing, Suicide
Tags: ads, Pepsi, Suicide
