Smells like my teenage bedroom

Is pot so mainstream now that it's become a viable advertising ingredient?

In the last couple of days I saw 2 pieces that featured pot on 2 sites that are about 179 degrees away from each other. The first was on AdAge.com and the second was on one of my favorite blogs, Adrants.com.

The AdAge piece talked about how Showtime placed a marijuana-scented strip into the Aug. 24th issue of Rolling Stone to promote the show Weeds. Since the show (which I think is one of the best on TV) is about a suburban single mom who deals pot, I thought it was brilliant placement.

The Adrants piece talked about an ad in the LA Weekly for The Farmacy, a "medical marijuana" store, that's giving a 10% discount to anyone who uses the code "Got Medicine".

You know, I think every agency or client or t-shirt maker who uses the phrase "Got _______" should pay Goodby 100% of the revenue that they make off that product, service or t-shirt. Maybe that'll get the friggin' thieves to stop stealing ideas.

But, back to the pot issue. I have to be honest. I'm worried that ads that promote the coolness of smoking/dealing pot (Weeds) or the outright selling of pot (The Farmacy) will encourage kids to smoke pot.

Now, I know that's pretty hypocritical of me, since I used to toke now and then as a teenager and I don't think it adversely effected me (unless you count me growing up to be a copywriter instead of the author of the great American epic novel or a neurosurgeon). But it still bugs me.

What do you think? Is pot so mainstream now that it's fine to use in ads? And if it is, what kind of impact will that have?

How many layouts are too many layouts?

Recently, I saw something I'd never seen before - 14 layouts for the same ad.

Not 14 different ads, but 14 different layouts for the same ad. Right there up on a conference room wall.

Each ad was the same size (full page) and had the same headline, the same font and type size, the same visuals, the same copy and the same color scheme.

The weird thing was (as if having 14 layouts wasn't weird enough), 8 people were sitting around the conference room table debating which 3 layouts should be presented to the client - the CD, the ACD, the AD and CW, the AE, the Asst. AE, the Planner and the Production Mgr. And they debated for over an hour.

I have to be honest, nothing really distinguished one layout from the next. They all looked basically alike.

Now, maybe it's just me, but 14 layouts for the exact same ad seems a little too much.

What's your take on this? How many layouts are too many? Or is the sky the limit? I'd like to know.

Oh, by the way, the ad totally sucked. In every layout.

Over-the-top Mercedes campaign over the head of the NAD

I was just reading today's Adweek.com, and it seems that the National Advertising Division (NAD) of the Better Business Bureau (BBB) just didn't get the over-the-top metaphors of the new Mercedes-Benz (MB) campaign from Merkley + Partners (M+P).

In one spot, a crash sled slams into the side of a new Mercedes GL class SUV and bounces off. The NAD ruled that "a typical consumer might not grasp that the crash is metaphorical." Mercedes even had the appropriate full-disclosure legal tag in the spot, but that wasn't enough for the NAD.

All I can say is: are you kidding me? Anyone in their right mind would know that this is a humorous, over-the-top metaphor.

But maybe that's the problem. Maybe, the NAD thinks that the "typical" consumer is not in his/her right mind. But that's another topic for another post.

I'm just concerned with the NAD's ruling on the issue of using metaphors in advertising.

If the NAD continues its "crusade" against metaphors, what's next? Similes? Allegories? Parables? Or, goodness no, Fairy Tales?

Are we doomed to a life of straight product demos and on-the-nose spokespeople?

What do you think?

Post #1

OK, this is like the 4,365,289th blog for creative freelancers in ad land. I'd like for this to be an open forum. So, if you have something to say, feel free to post it here. And if I have something to say, I'll say it here. And if neither of us have anything to say, well, let's just hang and enjoy the brownies.

By the way, this blog isn't just for freelancers. So, if you're on staff at an agency, cool. Feel free to post something, read something or just hang around.