Dannon Light & Fit Yogurt - Part Two

Welcome back, readers. This is part two of our revealing focus group study on the terrible ad for Dannon Light and Fit Yogurt. If you missed Part One yesterday, be sure to check it out. Let's get back to the action:

Welcome back, everyone. Please make up names for all of the women in the ad.

AJO - (1) Janelle (2) Liz (3) Beth

KT - (1) LaKeysha (2) Zoe (3) Sandra

JamFla (who clearly had been thinking about this for a while) -

(1) The Sassy AA woman – Grace. Grace is your go-to girl for all social events. She has a magnetic laugh and volunteers for Habitat for Humanity. She is the daughter of a single mom and did modeling in middle school to help make ends meet. Her ideal man would be a cross between Sean Patrick Thomas and Taye Diggs.

(2) The Brunette – Carmen. Carmen mostly likely has never held a serious job because she has rich parents who buy her everything. The look on her face tells me she has a few trust issues due to many dysfunctional relationships with emotionally detached men, but is finally opening up to dating again. She's feeling the pressure of bikini season on the horizon.

(3) The Blonde – I had a tougher time with this name choice. If she had been chubbier I would have said Becky.. Out of the 3 she looks like the bitchy one (see her eyebrows @ :07) who is short on the phone to patients at the doctor's office (where she works as a secretary but tells everyone she's an Executive Assistant). She also secretly envies her friends and has a lot of college debt to pay off for her General Studies degree that she got in 6 years, so I'll go with the name Courtney.

Which of the above-named women in the commercial do you most identify with? Which do you dislike the most? Why?

KT - LaKeysha. Clearly Zoe is the outcast. She is trying so hard to fit in, laughing more heartily than necessary, wearing more eye makeup, expressing her "joy" of her yogurt more than the others. I can tell she doesn't really even like the flavor she's eating but LaKeysha made her switch just before they sat down and now Zoe is masking her sadness. When the grocery store runs out of my favorite yogurt flavor I berade my friends until they switch their yogurt with me so that I have the best flavor. It makes me feel more beautiful and powerful. Obviously I don't like Sandra, just look at her, showing off her white tank top tucked into her jeans, what a bitch!

JamFla - Just like Sex and The City, this ad has a perfect match for every girl out there regardless of age, race, shape or size. I identify the most with Carmen, given her likelihood of having Latina roots. I dislike Courtney because she is a blonde, and because she's a total bitch.

AJO - I dislike Liz the most because she she makes weird laughing faces (watch her at 5 seconds). Also she orgasms loudly when eating yogurt. Lastly, she thinks she is so perfect, she doesn't say anything about her clothes not fitting her right. She needs to get REAL!

I like Beth. My pants are too tight too! I can really relate to that!

Why won't the women hold the cups of yogurt with all four fingers at once?

Janelle/LaKeysha/Grace's reckless finger waving almost stabbed out Beth/Sandra/Courtney's eye right after this photo was taken.

JamFla - My guess is the gals all had mani/pedis right before they came to get yogurt, so they don't want to mess up the fresh polish. Their cup-holding posture suggests a subtle yet sensual etiquette of the femme fatale. Men are more confident approaching a woman wearing pastel colors holding a yogurt container like a martini glass with her chest looking perky and legs crossed effortlessly, rather than a sweaty she-beast in a softball uniform who looks like she's riding the pine with a burly-knuckled fist wrapped tightly around a pint. It's just too bad Dannon L&F doesn't make appletini-flavored yogurt, am I right? LOL!

KT - They fear that if they grip the cups with their entire hand the flimsy plastic will squirt the yogurt all over the other ladies faces and start a huge cat fight over who's yogurt caused a permanent stain on the other's shirt. Plus the daily yogurt party is clearly a substitute for afternoon coffee and holding the yogurt with fewer fingers reminds them of sipping out of a coffee cup.

AJO - Maybe they are drying their nails that they just got done? Or Maybe one of them is missing a finger and they don't want the other one to feel bad?

How did this commercial change your opinion towards Dannon yogurt? Towards women?

AJO - Dannon is stupid. Especially if they think women bring yogurt to the mall and eat it together and talk like that.

Most women I know hate this commercial, so it makes me proud of women! I can't blame the actors because as you know, work is work.

KT - It makes me feel like Dannon is taking a page out of the Kotex handbook and really showing women what it means to be a woman. It makes me think that all women watching their afternoon stories believe this is the only way to enjoy dairy. It makes me sad for all these women because they forget that there is also laughing cow cheese, skinny cow ice cream, and almond breeze almond milk or even silk milk substitute. I just don't think we all realize how many dairy or dairy-like options are out there. This commercial is really progressing the woman's movement by empowering women to choose to eat 20 less calories a day and put a big dent into the obesity crisis facing America. Way to go Dannon.

JamFla - I wasn't a yogurt-eater prior to seeing this commercial. Seeing this ad tells me a number of things right off the bat: 1) I could afford to be more carefree and sassier with my girlfriends. 2) Dannon yogurt understands the day-in and day-out lives of all women. If you're young and trendy, choose Light & Fit. Your pants will fit better and your self esteem will shoot through the roof! But - if you're over 40, Jamie Lee Curtis speed-walks while advocating being "regular" with Activia. 3) By eating Dannon yogurt light and fit, I can drop pants sizes faster than Courtney gets on her knees.

---

Well, there you have it, readers - a truly terrible Dannon Yogurt ad that eats away at the soul of American society. Special thanks go out to our focus group members JamFla, KT and AJO for their participation. Be sure to check out their blogs for further reading enjoyment. And you can join in the action at home, too - just leave your opinions and feedback in the comments section below.

And finally, there is only one week left in our Terrible Reader Ad of the Month competition for April! Get your submissions in soon!

Dannon Light & Fit Yogurt - Terrible Ad of the Week

Hello, readers. This week's Terrible Ad of the Week is truly something special. It comes to us from Dannon Light and Fit Yogurt, which, as we will see, is yogurt geared directly towards the Sex & the City crowd. You've probably seen this ad or one of its inbred, spawn-of-darkest-hell cousins on TV in the last couple years, but here it is just in case:

Our loyal reader JamFla actually submitted this ad as a TRAOTM submission, but when I saw it, I knew we were dealing with something truly abominable. You see, readers, I may be the world's foremost expert in advertising and marketing, but in the ways of women, I'm probably only among the top 10-15 experts in the world - hardly something to brag about. So, this week, I've called in some help from my female friends to help me break down this terrible ad. That's right, readers, it's the first ever Advertisements Explained Reader Focus Group!

Our Focus Group members are all avid Sex and the City watchers and yogurt enthusiasts, so they can provide us with piercing insights into the inner working of this ad. Here is our panel of experts:

I tried to color-code their responses below, but Blogger is being a real B.

Earlier this week, I asked each panel member to view the ad (they signed waivers first, obviously) then asked them a series of questions about the ad. In today's entry, we'll get to know our panelists and their experiences with yogurt, and tomorrow we'll delve into their feelings about the ad itself. Enjoy the first half of the interview below, and be sure to check back tomorrow for Part Two!

Editor's note - Part Two is now available here.

Hi, panelists. Thanks for joining us.

JamFla - Good to be here.

AJO - Thanks for having us.

KT - Hi, Dan.

Let's get started. What do you talk about with your friends when you have yogurt parties?

JamFla -

Oh you know, the usual – the exhausting symptoms of PMS, juggling work with a booked social calendar, George Clooney, Jennifer Wiener books, which shoe tones the best (Sketcher, for the record), cosmopolitans, arranging a girls "carb night in" where we watch Katherine Heigl RomComs and drink Moscato di Asti, a man's inability to commit (or put the toilet seat down! LOL), wax jobs that didn't go well, Yaz birth control.

AJO -

My friends and I talk about how amazingly good the yogurt is of course! Also about clothes, make up, and boys (giggle giggle). We talk about chocolate, swimsuit season and how fat we think we are. Actually I think this a trick question; I don't eat yogurt with my friends, I eat it alone at work at my desk while reading my Gmail....

KT -

How saving 20 calories by making the right yogurt choice really saves the entire day (and leaves plenty more calories for the bottles of wine we'll consume later that night in order to forget how horrible our lives really are.)

Please describe how eating yogurt with your friends makes you feel (for example: finding clothes that fit good, burning this dress good, etc.):

KT -

When I eat yogurt with my friends and cheers the yogurt cups it reminds me that the day my clothes fit well has long since passed and the only thing I'll be doing for the next 40 years is regretting all the full fat yogurt cups I ate in my teens and twenties. Those extra 20 calories per morning yogurt cup really f-ed me over.

JamFla -

I think eating low-cal yogurt with my girlfriends gives us a strong connection on both an emotional and physical level – I mean – it's almost like being on the same menses cycle! We all love yogurt, we all love being thin, we all love getting attention in public when we laugh, and we definitely all love something low-cal!

AJO -

Binging on Chocolate during a PMS Rage Good! Fitting my fat ass into Spanx good! Watching a marathon of the Big C followed by a marathon of Private Practice good! Naming my boyfriend pillow after McDreamy good! Only having to shave my legs once a month good! Realizing I am just as fabulous as Carrie Bradshaw good! Being a good lady driver good!

Well, there you have it. Check back tomorrow for Part Two of our exciting focus group! Dannon Light and Fit will get torn to shreds, just like your insides after eating Dannon Light and Fit!

Continue to Part Two!

Starbucks Drive Thru Reader Challenge - Part 2

For last week's Terrible Ad of the Week, you may remember that I posted a picture of some terrible advertising from the Starbucks Drive Thru and challenged readers to point out the problems with it. Today, I am happy to report that I received 0 total responses from the challenge. Clearly, the Advertisements Explained server was not equipped to handle the overwhelming volume of responses from my legions of readers.

My IT support staff worked on the problem all weekend.

So, what exactly is wrong with the Starbucks advertising? Well, loyal readers, Starbucks thinks we are all idiots.

Apparently someone over in the Starbucks marketing department heard that "going green" was cool now, so they decided to put some signs up in the drive thru to let everyone know how hip and progressive they are. And to make sure that everyone knows how hip they are all the time, they mounted three incandescent light fixtures outside to light up the signs...and left them on during the day.

I had to adjust the shutter settings for this picture to account for all the extra light.

Really, Starbucks? You're "committed to minimizing our environmental footprint" but you can't remember to train your skilled baristas to turn off the outdoor lighting during the daytime? Or maybe you're more committed to making money and seeming cool than actually tackling environmental problems.

This "environmental" marketing is like the Sunchips Eco-bag fiasco all over again, except that instead of finding out that people are stupid through marketing trial and error, Starbucks just went ahead and assumed everyone was stupid from the get go. Don't stand for this, discerning consumers!

Of course, the most discerning of you will say, "But Dan, why were you in the Starbucks drive thru to begin with? Did you have a lapse in your normally infallible marketing judgement?" The answer? Market research. To combat terrible ads and marketing ploys, I have to get out there and tackle the worst offenders so you don't have to. With great power comes great responsibility.

I also like iced hazelnut lattes.

Starbucks Drive Thru (Reader Challenge!) - Terrible Ad of the Week / News and updates

Hello readers and discerning consumers! It's April 15 - did you pay your taxes today? If you did, you are clearly not a marketing genius like me.

Let me fill you in on a little secret: as a marketing genius, I have found that I acquire wealth faster by not paying my taxes. In fact, the quickest way to see a 10% - 20% increase in your wealth within one year is to not pay your taxes or make any contributions to social security. There are many ways to do this. You might hide your money in a mattress or deposit it in an off-shore account in the Caymans. Or, for a fraction of the cost of real currency, you could print your own fake money and send that to the IRS. Me? I prefer laundering my income through a certain "non-profit" internet blog. There are literally no rules in the economic jungle.
My personal finance model - for educational purposes only
Speaking of deadlines, there are only 15 more days left in April for you to submit an ad for the Terrible Reader Ad of the Month! (How's that for you, Jamfla?) Who will it be? What terrible ad will torture us this time? Why hasn't anyone submitted an ad since last month? You can submit your ads here, and you can check out last month's TRAOTM here. Don't miss your chance to be part of the greatest marketing blog of ALL TIME.*

At this point, many of you regular readers are probably saying "Wait, where in the hell is the Terrible Ad of the Week?" and "Why does Dan appear to be phoning it in this week?" Well, loyal readers, I'm phoning it in because I'm working on an extra special project for next week's entry. It's going to be revolutionary, so don't miss it.

But don't think that I'm going to leave you hanging without a terrible ad this week. In fact, I have a special challenge that will test your discerning consumer skills to the core. I now present you with the Advertisements Explained Terrible Ad of the Week Reader Challenge!

A couple weeks ago, I snapped this picture of some terrible marketing in the Starbucks Drive Thru:

Click on the picture to see the big version

Using the array of discerning consumer skills that you've no doubt developed as a reader of this blog, do the following:

1. Analyze this Starbucks advertising and find everything that is wrong with it.
2. Post your observations in the comments section below.
3. Wait attentively.

Later this week, I will return like Gandalf charging down the hill to Helm's Deep at dawn on the third day and post my own observations (or the answers, if you will) to this Starbucks marketing debacle. In the meantime, I will be working on the special project for next week.

Good luck readers!

* This claim is based on the fact that someone found my blog last week by Googling the terms "world's greatest marketing genius" - thank you, Google Analytics, for telling me what everyone already knows.

Terrible Ad of the Week - Nintendo DS Jam Sessions

Hello readers! It's only been a week since my last entry, but it feels like a lot longer. My bowling league ended last week, and to be honest, it feels like I'm adrift in a timeless purgatory. Lost without purpose. But, there are still terrible ads out there plaguing our society, so I can't rest. With great marketing genius comes great responsibility.

This week's Terrible Ad of the Week comes to us from the Nintendo DS game Jam Sessions. Jam Sessions is a game where you pretend to play guitar while you sit around with your friends and sing along. "Wait," you say, "isn't that like Guitar Hero?" Well, you would be correct, except that Jam Sessions is not at all fun or challenging and is like Guitar Hero for people that have no fingers.

I'm going to show you the ad for explanatory purposes, but please try refrain from clawing out your eyes and ears before the ad is over.*



As you can see, the main object of Jam Sessions is to wave your hand back and forth over the Nintendo DS while your lame friends mercilessly butcher songs that would otherwise be enjoyable. Yes, that's right, you just wave your hand over the DS. No finger, no buttons. Just waving.

So, according to this ad, Nintendo and Ubisoft want you to pay real money for a game that you could also play with the DS turned OFF. Or without a DS at all. Here's a hot consumer tip for you parents out there in case your kid wants this pile of crap game:

1. Drive your child to Best Buy or Gamestop.
2. Walk around behind the store.
3. Pick up a piece of trash that's lying around.
4. Give it to your child and tell them that it's the new version of Jam Sessions.
5. Watch your child get beat up as they play Jam Sessions and sing aloud on the bus.

Jam Sessions: Greasy Pizza Box and the new Mossy Rock: Limited Edition.

Besides the product itself, the other truly terrible element of this ad is the "music." The song that the kids are "singing" is Santeria, by the So-Cal band Sublime. And not only have they used a Sublime song in the ad; they've used the most PG, families-first snippet of Sublime's most radio-friendly hit to sell their shitty product. Not cool, Nintendo.

If you're going to use an awesome band like Sublime in your ad, you have to go all out - none of this pussyfooting Top-40 PC stuff. I used my marketing prowess to design some alternate storyboards that feature Sublime's more representative work, while still featuring the singalong group of friends vibe:

I sent these storyboards to Nintendo as pro bono gesture to the inept marketing department that came up with this one, but I have yet to hear back.

And while this ad is truly terrible to the core, there is one part I do like. That's the final slogan: Say hello to your new guitar. I like this slogan because it gives me something to scream at Jam Sessions ad executives right before I punch them in the face.

*DISCLAIMER: Advertisements Explained is not responsible for any personal harm or property damage that results from watching this ad.

**Editor's note: Why is there a surfboard on the bus?

Terrible Reader Ad of the Month - World's Best Cat Litter

Hello readers! Can you believe that you've already been reading Advertisements Explained for a month now? It seems like just yesterday that I launched this site and turned the advertising world on its head. In that short time, Advertisements Explained has had over 700 page views, and I've received lots of great feedback from discerning consumers like yourselves. Can't you just feel your quality of life improving with your newfound marketing insights? (Let us know how your life has improved in the Comments section below.)

Of course, this also means that it's time to announce our first ever Terrible Reader Ad of the Month! Many of you submitted terrible ads this month, and choosing the most terrible of these was no easy feat. However, because I am a marketing genius, I was able to narrow it down to one truly terrible, terrible ad that really scrapes the bottom of the marketing barrel.

The ad is for a product called World's Best Cat Litter, and it was submitted by our loyal reader and discerning consumer Freda. I would try to describe it myself, but Freda pretty much said it best in her description of the ad:

"People smelling cat pee. Sick."

So, without further adieu, the Terrible Reader Ad of the Month for March 2011:

As you can see, the marketing strategy over at World's Best Cat Litter is to sell the product with the World's Worst Advertising. I think the real marketing genius here is whoever convinced these people to sniff vials of cat urine and put cat litter in their mouths. From one marketing genius to another, bravo World's Best Cat Litter!

And congratulations to Freda on winning the inaugural Terrible Reader Ad of the Month competition! If you haven't submitted a terrible ad yet, you can do so 24/7 by using the Submit an Ad form above. And if you submitted an ad last month, don't worry, you're still in the running for next month's competition.

Until next time, keep your discerning eyes peeled for terrible ads, and keep reading Advertisements Explained for the worst ads and the hottest marketing insights!