The smoke out who’s yr daddy cats are putting it together for another round. The 8th annual horse/bc’s homage to roots rock and chops kicks off next June, perfectly timed to coincide with the onset of N. Carolina’s balmy summer season of sweat.
It’s a $30 ticket before the show for two days of ass-kickin’ tunes, OEM women and a house card of builders fresh and familiar.
Event info:
www.horsebackstreetchoppers.com
If it’s January it must be Dakar on cable. For my money, and if you saw my cable bill you’d agree, the best produced sports show on the tube — period. Slo-mo, helicopter, POV, remote and static shots are edited and fed around the world for near-real time consumption.
New York Times ad critic Stuart Elliott’s November 13th column takes a look at Suzuki’s innovative car campaign, themed “It’s gonna be a great ride,” now running in print, on cable and over the web.
The campaign, which so far does the tongue-in-cheek thing with the road captain rider removing “his” helmet only to shake out a huge extension — didn’t know you could fit that much hair under a helmet — as she and her Rodeo Drive wild thing pack surround the previously threatened car driver to return his left behind cell phone. Great line, “You left this at the diner. It’s got a new number in it,” proves the point that women, even those who ride in packs, get all gooey for men in like branded cars.
I think the spots do a good job of getting across the idea that Suzuki makes both bikes and cars. Or is it because I already knew that? For the average consumer, it might make the point. Or just muddy the water.
As one of only three (Honda, BMW) bike builders who also make cars Suzuki makes good use of cross product pollination. And they are fun, continuing a rich tradition among advertisers of setting up any group of two or more riders as potentially hazardous until proven otherwise.
“Always low prices” bites the dust. So how did the newly formed agency DraftFCB and partnering Carat win the nearly $600-mil plus account away from agency of 32-year record Bernstein Rein? According to Ad Age, agency head Howard Draft, up-to-date on Wal-Mart’s senior vp-mar com Julie Roehm’s penchant for really expensive cars, invited her for a spin around the block in his spiffy econo-car Aston Martin.
The expensive and cantankerous import wouldn’t light and had to be towed – towed! – but his spanking new shop gets the account anyway. Other behind the scenes strategies that apparantly paid off? Actual shopping trips to selected Wal-Marts by agency execs with, get this, real Wal-Mart shoppers! And they actually brought in one of their experience guides to run the focus group gauntlet.
So I guess if they’d been after Disney, it would have meant a walk down Main Street with a Disney obsessive adult in denial as their ersatz seeing eye dog metaphor. Anyway, it’s going to be clever campaign that convinces Target afficienados to switch allegence and park out by the RV patch for a less subtle selection in a less swell environment.
What’s the point? Nothing much. But the fact that Wal-Mart’s going through a rough patch on a couple of really sensative points, and that their core audience is pretty well defined, still has me stumped as to what in their previous behavior, brief that it is, gave DraftFCB a boost over the bar. Data management expertise is cited, but what does the car thing have to do with it, other than status? And if so, isn’t that rather oxymoronic for this ultimate anti-status behemoth?
Wal-Mart is what it is – huge, lumbering, and with a very narrowly defined sex appeal. One thing’s for certain, probably. “Always low prices” is history.
Young glam shooter Sam Dixon’s (ex-Orlando now mid-Atlantic) running hot with plenty of tasty exposure over on K.R. Ball’s bikernet.com. His brand new pub Biker Beauties (www.bikerbeauties.com) launches this month as a limited edition premier issue and already there’s serious talk of a national rollout within the year.
Over in Birmingham, Alabama, David Gomez is making a quieter entry into the b2b ranks with his smartly positioned Powersports Management (www.powersportsmag.com) startup. Drawing on the abundant editorial talent ranks of the Iron City, Dave’s got some fresh ideas on how to present industry buzz to his dealer audience. His premier issue (October) closes September 15th.
Both these titles offer the promise of a new slant on the powersports biz. It’s a tough road, but we think they can lay down some fresh rubber.
AdForum’s Top 5 commercials for the week included Ogilvey and Mather – Africa’s 50-second spot for Harley, which features adultery, voyeurism and just a few seconds of Softail footage to establish the brand.
Las Vegas’ “What Happen’s Here, Stays Here” theme may push the envelope in the States. This effort (“Affair”) by Johannesburg shop Fresh Water Films rips it up and tosses it out the window.
The spot opens with the resident bad boy pulling up late in the day and a nice shot of the kickstand being lowered. A quick cut inside the house to a chick and her boyfriend in the sack is an obvious sign of trouble, big trouble, ahead.
But all isn’t what it seems, and you have to watch the surprise ending to figure the plot out. Closes with a nice fade in dimensional shot of the bar and shield over the slogan “R E S P E C T”.
I’ll try to put it up.