Occasionally, in Brands & Humour, I do a little personal newsletter: one that shows one or two signposts in my career. At the risk of being self-indulgent, this is one of them.
(Plus, it’s about beer. In the words of Al Murray, the Pub Landlord, ‘All hail the ale.’)
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I’ve been working in marketing and advertising now for 24 years. In that time I’ve met some great people, some good people and one or two utter morons. But that near-quarter-of-a-century has given me, I would hope, a pretty good radar for a fine ad:
…A fine, funny ad:
…And a load of utter rubbish:
But very occasionally I’ve seen an ad campaign that’s foxed me. Is it good? Is it bad? I mention all of this because back in the early noughties I saw a campaign by Asahi, the Japanese beer brand, and this was my reaction: head-scratching.
The campaign didn’t last long — just a few posters, some print executions in magazines, and that was it. But perhaps its brevity made it more memorable.
Here are three executions:
Many readers — especially those born post-1990 — might well be baffled by these people. All three are minor British TV celebrities from the 1980s and 90s. The first, Henry Kelly, hosted a daytime quiz show called Going for Gold; Bonnie Langford was an actress and dancer; Richard Whiteley hosted a popular quiz show, Countdown.
But here’s the thing:
…What the hell is going on here?
Are they parodying…
Japanese advertising?
Japanese admiration for ‘Britishness’?
British admiration for minor celebrities?
inept translation (Richard Whiteley is ‘Commanding and a Worldly’)?
Or… are they simply the actual Japanese ads, pasted onto the wall of a London tube station?
In search of answers, I contacted a Japanese-English translator, Rachel Nicholson, (below and on Instagram here), based in Hiroshima, who very kindly helped me out.
But, despite her good work, there were no insights. The translated Japanese doesn’t give too much away1. She did suggest, however, that the ads might have been transplanted in situ, from their native country: “Japan has a tendency to think: oh, [certain Japanese thing] is popular with people from overseas. Let’s use it over and over because it worked well that one time!”
One clue is that these ads came out about the same time as Lost in Translation. If you haven’t seen it, this movie features a successful but cynical American actor, played by Bill Murray, who flies to Tokyo to shoot a whiskey commercial. Perhaps the Asahi ads were meant to allude to that film: a Westerner promoting a Japanese drink for hard cash, with the forced, ironic enthusiasm that required.
Twenty years on, frankly, I’m still baffled. But from that bafflement there’s a dotted line to what I do now. I wondered how a Japanese audience might react to these. I wondered who the butt of the joke is: the celebrity or the Japanese or the British audience, enduring the tired cliché of a celebrity holding a bottle up. I wondered where does amusement end and where does bigotry begin.
Oprah Winfrey, who knows a thing or two about asking questions, once said, ‘Ask the right questions, and the answers will always reveal themselves’. These ads made me try and find the right questions to ask. In terms of knowing how humour works best with brands, knowing those questions is critical.
As for Asahi, they soon ditched this campaign for pastures new. Last year they were the official beer of the Rugby World Cup, with one ad showing a big rugby ball and a big bottle of beer in a crowded stadium.
What do we make of this? Admittedly, it doesn’t contain any minor British TV celebrities, but it doesn’t contain any imagination, either.
Many thanks for reading,
Paddy
pg@studiogilmore.com
+44 7866 538 233
LinkedIn: here
Rachel’s translation: (Small white text) Asahi Super Dry. The taste that never gets old. A dry, refined and clear flavour. Henry Kelly This is what we consider the true flavour of beer. (Big yellow text) A refined and clear flavour (Black text) Pride and integrity. Manly. This is what dry beer should be. Asahi Super Dry. These words are repeated in all three ads.