When good clients do bad things; life on Planet Acronym

Why are the likes of McDonald’s and Mars making such shocking errors of judgement, wonders Dominic Mills. Plus: visit a parallel universe where industry bodies are known only by a set of initials.

You may not approve of their products, or their status as giant, faceless corporations, but it would be hard to deny that Mars and McDonald’s are among the better members of the advertiser citizentry.

They produce good – occasionally outstanding – work, treat their agencies well and, overall, believe in the power of advertising. Just think of last year’s Maltesers ads.

So why does it sometimes all go wrong? Last week both were forced to withdraw ads that overstepped the boundaries of good taste. McDonald’s was accused by the Daily Mail of exploiting child bereavement, Mars – or more accurately Skittles – of producing something freakishly weird for US Mother’s Day.

Even by the standards of Skittles ads – mostly funny, often quasi-surreal and sometimes unsettling (take this King Midas-style ad for example) – the now-binned ‘Umbilical’ is right on, if not over, the edge.

You can see it here. For the squeamish, here’s what happens…a Mum eats a bag of Skittles. Her 30-something son sits beside her on the sofa guessing the colour. As the camera pulls back, we see he is still connected to her by the umbilical cord…so he’s eating them too. “I feel personally violated,” one mum wrote on social media.

Well, yes, you can see why she might feel like that. There’s nothing exploitative about the ad, but it is downright creepy.

The McDonald’s ad (below) is altogether different. A young boy, maybe aged ten, talks to his mum about his late dad. The more he asks about his father, the less like him he seems – except for one thing: they both like Filet-O-Fish.

I know: mawkish, exploitative, sentimental in a ghastly way. But would it have been banned by the ASA, despite the volume of complaints in the first few days? Personally, as much as I disliked the ad, I can’t see why. Nevertheless, banned or not, McDonald’s did the sensible thing by pulling it.

But why do advertisers and their agencies make such egregious errors of judgement? In the case of the Pepsi/Kendall Jenner shocker, I blamed the in-house agency dynamic and the lack of outside objectivity that an agency would bring.

Since the McDonald’s ad was made by the normally sensible Leo Burnett, that explanation doesn’t stand up.

In the McDonald’s case, I blame the drive for ‘purpose’. These days advertisers feel the need to connect themselves to something wider – as in Pepsi and the more recent Heineken ad – and more meaningful than a mere product message – i.e. how McDonald’s stimulate memories that can bring a son closer to his father. Except that whatever made them think death was the right vehicle through which to show that.

And where McDonald’s and Skittles come together is in the wish to stand out in a sea of blandness. Inevitably then, the boundaries of taste are exceeded.

In Skittles’ case – a YouTube ad – it’s compounded by the nature of the platform on which pretty much anything goes. The only way to gain traction there is to be excessive – whether through humour or bad taste. As advertisers get more out there, it’s bound to backfire.

In these circumstances, the voice that says ‘hold on, should we really be doing this?’ gets drowned out, or worse nobody has the courage to say anything.

I don’t know how to fix this, except to say every advertiser and agency should hire the modern version of the court jester or wise fool, the historical figure who is allowed to speak his or her mind without fear or favour to mediaeval kings. “What the crap are you thinking? Kill it now,” they should be able to say.

And yes, having seen the Pepsi Max ‘fan’ ad for the UEFA last night, they could have done a court jester too.

In the ad, Pepsi effectively claims the most famous saying about football – ‘Some people believe football is a matter of life and death. But it’s more important than that’ – as its own insight into the ups and downs of fanhood. (Don’t tell me about it: I’m experiencing my own pain on that score this week).

To anybody who doesn’t know the origins of the aphorism (the legendary Bill Shankly, circa 1960s), it gives Pepsi the sheen of authenticity. ‘Yes,’ it says, ‘here at Pepsi we really understand you.’

But to anyone who does, it represents everything that fans loathe about advertisers trying to ‘own’ football. Utterly fake.

There’s life on Planet Acronym

If you worry about where former media people go in the autumn of their careers (or perhaps you yourself are contemplating life in the slower lane), I bring good news.

It’s possible to travel the world in a parallel universe we can call Planet Acronym, a place where regional, global or pan-regional industry bodies known only by a set of initials – and funded by subscriptions from hard-pressed media owners – gather to chew whatever fat it is that they chew. Indeed, this may even be the same fat as chewed over by other acronyms, or even the same as the previous year. Each, I think, is its own closed world.

This was a world that had passed me by until a few weeks ago when I met a good work friend.

“I haven’t seen you for a while,” I said. “Where have you been?”

Friend: “Toronto for the WFA. Then New Orleans for the OAAA.”

Me (thinking): Hmm, what do they stand for? But who cares…lucky you.

Friend: “Next I’m off to Athens for EASA and ICAS.”

Me (still thinking): Never heard of them.

Friend: “And after that it’s Stockholm. For FEPE.”

Me (thinking): WTF is FEPE?

Friend: “But I can’t make up my mind about going to Mumbai. For the OAC, of course.”

Me (thinking): OMG. That’s so OOO.