I’ve mentioned before the doomed advertising Heinz employed to market its Tomato Soup. I thought they’d listened – it hasn’t been on for months – but it seems I was wrong. Partly, at any rate.
What Heinz failed to appreciate was that the fault lay with the advertising agency it was using. You see, when an advertising company gets an idea into its head, it milks it dry. To make matters worse, others often copy it, and before you know it you’ve got people whistling tunelessly in every bloody new ad that comes along (whistling is unfortunately still in vogue, particularly among the lesser advertising agencies who have caught on to it last and who are busy trying to market third-rate products for lesser retailers). Or you get annoying whispering adverts like the Secret Escapes one – whispering has been picked up by a number of companies as a way of selling crap in greater quantities (although it has to be said that the Army did it first a couple of years ago in an attempt to get people to sign up in order to increase their chances of being killed by going into active duty*).
A certain high street retailer has pictures of ugly people on the side of its lorries – wearing face cream, or blowing their noses. It seems Heinz is now milking that one dry itself. In its latest ad it has an ugly woman doing all kinds of childish things, and then slurping a spoonful of tomato soup – which is then stuck all over her lips.
When will people get it into their heads that wearing food only appeals to weirdoes who do internet searches on XXX sites, or women whose brains have turned to jelly as a result of childbirth, and who think that babies covered in pureed vegetables is “cute”?
* For people out there who weren’t in the queue when senses of humour were being handed out, this is a joke and not a criticism of any of our forces personnel.