Crap TV adverts

One advert is irritating me lately and really hope that I'm not the only one that cringes every time I see it.







It's the Bridgestone tyres advert, and I just don't get what it's trying to tell me.

Problem number one: The music bed is completely to cock. It starts with an operatic attempt at "World in Union" which, whilst not my first choice for a tyre commercial, isn't completely unacceptable, but the "sting" at the end is. It's completely out of sync and is the sort of thing that would fail a GCSE media studies project, let alone a multi-million pound marketing campaign.

Then, the images. Why would I deliberately drive over a wooden plank with 12 inch nails protruding upwards? Why would I be interested in F1 slicks that aren't road legal? Why would the fact that Bridgestone tyres are used on a Boeing 747 encourage me to put them on my Citroen Saxo? You really haven't identified your demographic have you?

I'd love to meet the marketing exec who signed it off.

Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find the offending article online, but I have managed to find another Bridgestone commercial from years gone by, but one that probably didn't make our airwaves.

The ad still seems to be more one for a certain car manufacturers brake discs, but it's better than what they are currently inflicting upon us.

You're Fired!

Confirmation has come that America's biggest television commercial will finally be pulled from the airwaves, with NBC dropping the reality TV show 'The Apprentice'.









After falling ratings on the wrong side of the Atlantic, Donald Trump's televised job interviews have been axed after six series, three of which have been shown back here in Britain.

It's in contrast to the same show fronted by Sir Alan Sugar in the UK, which has been a massive ratings success, with last year's contest taking a 27% audience share but that's probably down to how much better the UK version is.

The problem with US shows is the gross overuse of product placement. Friends was notorious for it, the American idol judges sit at their desk with bright red Coca-Cola glasses and The Apprentice is also up there as one of the worst culprits in the book.
You only have to look at the not-in-the-slightest-subtle plugs for a host of multinational companies to realise that you are watching a one-hour collection of commercial breaks. Only iRobot and Casino Royale were more obvious.
The UK version is sometimes criticised on similar grounds, even though product placement is forbidden on UK television, but the instances are limited (even if you are able to read the web address on the side of Sir Alan's rented helicopter)

Part of the problem is blamed squarly at TiVo, that TV recording system that only the American's bought, for encouraging the product placement rise.
The one perk with TiVo in the US though is that it can remove the commercial breaks, giving the viewer an ad-free experience without the need to pause and re-start the VCR. That function in the UK wasn't offered. The commercial broadcasters, understandably, refused to support the system because of the already stringent advertising laws.
As a result we quickly realised that paying £300 and then £10 a month for TiVo was a stupid idea and within 3 years, TiVo left us alone to sign up to Sky+.

I've always been a supporter of the BBC and it's public funding. Anyone who isn't would be advised to compare the two shows and still maintain the same opinion. The American's do mke some good TV shows, Friends, Scrubs, The Simpsons, Futurama, Family Guy; the list goes on. They also make some decent TV commercials. Unfortunately, it's sometimes quite hard to tell the difference.

The Worst TV Advert in the World?

Happy New Year folks! It's January 2007 and amongst other things, that means it's time for the January sales.






January sales tend now tend to take place in December rather than January, as over-eager company directors decide that they need to get the mad rush in as of Boxing Day to make their end-of-year figures look slightly better.

The net result is that on from 5:30pm on Christmas Eve (the time that all large shops must be closed by on Sunday) we're bombarded with adverts from furniture warehouses about their "Biggest sale ever starting Boxing Day 9:00am"

But the adverts are often terrible, this year being no exception. DFS are infamous for crap adverts but this years prize goes to 'Land of Leather'.

Using Chesney Hawk's "The One and Only" in any commercial is effectively signing your own death warrant to start with. The only situation that song actually ever works is a 3:00am in the Student's Union. Any other time is just unforgivable. I'm sure there's probably some old English law somewhere that says that if you find someone with that track on their iPod, you are legally allow to perforate their ear-drums.

If that wasn't bad enough, the voice over is just despicable.
In Britain, you could quite easily come up with a list of the most irritating celebrities on TV. You would then lock that list in a safe somewhere to prevent any advertising exec from thinking of using them on your commercial. Keith Chegwin would be on there, Jodie Marsh would be there somewhere as would Nikki from Big Brother but number one with the bullet would be former children's TV presenter Timmy Mallet.

Timmy Mallet personified everything that was wrong with TV in the early 90's with his programme "Wacaday". He was, quite frankly, an idiot.
Today he makes his living doing student gigs around the country, selling pink mallets to drunken freshers for £15 a hit. So on that basis, there is absolutely no way on earth that you would ever consider this fool for a TV commercial, unless of course you are Land of Leather.

So not only have you got a terrible song to your advert, it's accompanied by the most detestable man ever to grace British television.
For this reason alone, Land of Leather's January sale should be boycotted post-haste.