Bob Garfield retires

Bob Garfield, a prominent writer for Ad Age, has decided to retire. He writes the column, Ad Review on the website, and is highly respected in the industry. He recently posted a fair well write up, entitled, “Garfield Says Adieu“. It is extremely well written and insightful. He tells his own story of how he got to be where he is today. He also discusses some of the worst ads he has seen throughout his career. And as a highly respected ad critic, his opinion could make or break some companies. He said that one of the most offensive ads…

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Vintage Beer Ads

Today, there are many regulations in the advertising of alcohol. Before these laws were put into place, there were many ads put out that seem shocking today. Perhaps the most shocking I came across is an ad for Blatz Beer. It features a mother with her baby, and tries to promote Blatz Beer as a nourishing, essential drink for mothers and babies. It claims to provide benefits for the mother, which the baby will in turn feel as well. It just seems so shocking; I cannot believe this was ever a real advertisement. You would never see anything like this…

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The Flintstones sell cigarettes?

Looking at vintage ads can be a very fun activity. Just like ads for alcohol, it is astonishing what they could get away with when advertising cigarettes back in the day. Advertising cigarettes has so many restrictions now. It is especially illegal to market cigarettes toward children. A vintage ad for Winston Cigarettes does exactly that. It features the Flintstones, a cartoon directed towards children, selling the product. It is very interesting to see how the advertising industry has evolved to where it is today. Flintstones Winston Cigarettes Ad

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The Axe Effect

Many people are familiar with the Axe brand of body spray. Their latest commercial features thousands of women running through trees, and jumping over rocks to get to a man on the beach who is spraying himself with Axe. These women are literally coming at him in every direction, and of course, each one of them is gorgeous and wearing a bikini. Obviously there is a sense of humor in this advertisement. But is it giving off a bad message about women? This is showing that a man can spray on Axe, and a woman will do anything to be…

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Great guerrilla

I came across some really great guerrilla advertising campaigns used on buses. One is for a Baltica Beer. The poles to hang on for people who stand in a bus, actually have beer cans around them. So when you hold onto them, especially in a group, it looks like everyone is holding a beer. Another cool guerrilla bus campaign i found was for a brand of watches. The straps people hold onto, similar to the poles, actually looked like watches that you could slip your hand into. When people hold onto the straps, it actually looks like they are wearing the…

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Does it offend you? Or make you think?

There is always controversy when it comes to animal rights advertising. In the United States PETA is responsible for creating some pretty attention grabbing campaigns. Most of the time they feature a naked celebrity, claiming they’d “rather go naked than wear fur.” If you thought this was shocking you should see what some animal rights groups are doing overseas. A group called, “Humans for Animals”, has produced some extremely shocking advertisements which were created by TBWA in Paris. The ad is set in an arctic location. It features an image of an adult seal killing a human baby. In the…

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A visit to Red Tettemer

We all know that joining TAC has many benefits. One of the main benefits is getting to visit real, and prominent ad agencies. Recently, TAC visited Red Tettemer, a mid-sized agency located right outside of Philadelphia. I got to talk about the visit with Michelle Dunst, 21, who actually set up the trip to the agency. Michelle is a TAC member studying advertising, and in the copywriting track. DW: “So you organized the trip to Red Tettemer? How did you go about deciding upon Red Tettemer as an agency to visit?” MD: “We decided to go there because they have…

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