Tag: commentary

For years, advertisers have used the great outdoors as a marketing
tool. But Great Lakes Radio Consortium commentator Suzanne Elston
thinks it’s time we starting selling something else.

Transcript

For years, advertisers have used the great outdoors as a marketing
tool. But Great Lakes Radio Consortium commentator Suzanne Elston
thinks it’s time we starting selling something else:

I saw the most amazing commercial on television last week. The whole
thing was a series of video clips of wild animals and their offspring
playing in their natural habitats. There was a really cute shot of a
baby hippo playing with its mom in the water. And then it showed a
baby elephant struggling to climb over a tree lying on the ground.
All of a sudden this big maternal trunk swings down and wraps itself
around the baby elephant’s backside and gentle lifts it over the
tree. It was adorable.

Then there were baby seals frolicking on the
ice and fox cubs playing in a field. There was no voice over on the
commercial – just the sound of Bryan Adams voice singing “Forever
Young”. It was beautiful. The final scene was a mother lion sitting
proudly, looking straight at the camera, while a lion cub nestled in
her front paws. It really took your breath away.

The image of the lion and her cub faded and was replaced with a
package of Pampers disposable diapers. An announcer voice simply
said, “Forever Young”.

I couldn’t t believe what I was seeing. Disposable diapers are
arguably one of the most environmentally damaging products we’ve come
up, and here we are using wild animals to sell them.

But it doesn’t matter because it looks good. It’s like this other
commercial for a sports utility vehicle I’ve seen lately. The truck
meanders in slow motion through a pristine forest, while a giant
grizzly bear stands on its haunches and sings opera. The entire scene
is bliss. And then you realize that that wildest thing SUVs drivers
are likely to see is the mall parking lot on a Saturday morning.

But it doesn’t matter because image is everything. That’s why SUVs
are the hottest selling item right now. As long as looks good and
projects the right image well then let’s buy it.

Forget about the fact that all these hot convenience items are
ripping up the planet. They make life easier and they make you feel
great. Who cares if we destroy the environment in the process? We can
always create a new world with the magic of computer animation and
some marketing wizardry.

Or – maybe we actually use all this marketing know-how to clean up
the mess we’ve made. I think it’s time we started selling that idea.

Host Tag: Suzanne Elston is a syndicated columnist living in Courtice, Ontario.