This Israeli TV commercial by BBR Saatchi & Saatchi starts by showing the candid reaction of the type of consumers who find their product disgusting and yucky. Then it shows the sublime contentment of a target customer. The message is clear: Strauss Group’s Splendid bitter dark chocolate is meant to appeal to worldly sophisticated palates, and adults don’t have to worry that kids will raid their candy stash.
These are ads that assume viewers have a certain familiarity with how the word game, Scrabble, is played, and enjoy the intellectual pursuit of deciphering connections. Created by ad agency, Twiga, in Kiev, Ukraine, and design firm Tough Slate Design, these print ads are treated as visual anagrams that challenge viewers to combine two disparate things to make a new word – e.g., pen-guin, crow-bar, car-rot, cat-epillar. It’s amusing to imagine combinations of your own.
In Spain, ad agency Lola Madrid and film director Rodrigo Saavedra created a video commercial for Scrabble that turned real words into anagrams, weaving them all together into a fanciful love story. Some of the anagram connections were a bit of a stretch, but not so much that you weren’t charmed by the story line – and creative effort.
Columbus, Ohio-based Danielle Evans, who goes by the firm name Marmalade Bleue, pursues a quirky design genre – food typography. She uses food ingredients to create very ephemeral letterforms, such as in a “Food for Thought” video for Target stores.
On her Marmalade Bleue blog, Evans explains how her approach differs from others who have used food ingredients as a writing medium. “Food type had been used sparingly as one-offs in the past, all of which utilized the materials incidentally without applying a typographer’s touch,” she says. “The novelty of food as lettering trumped the presentation and legibility of the forms. I chose to apply my background in illustration, sculpting, and painting to create letterforms with dimension, play of light and edges, and happenstance flourishes with personality.”
Describing her methodology, Evans adds, “Rarely do I use typefaces or fonts to influence my work, instead I rely on the materials to dictate the best course. I’ve chosen a symbiotic relationship with my materials, suggesting rather than forcing their direction. Lettering allows for incidental flourishes and ligatures associated with calligraphy, the true nature of my work.” Intriguing and beautiful.
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In a marketing campaign created by Y&R, Sao Paolo, Brazil. Ironage, an isotonic sports drink made in Brazil, targeted athletes who constantly strive to exceed their own personal best. In addition to print ads featuring athletes, Y&R promoted the brand strategically in places where customers were most likely to congregate – namely, gyms, parks, and health clubs. There, they introduced vending machines, dubbed “Pulse Machines.” Consistent with the brand’s slogan “Keep Moving,” the machines read the customer’s heart rate with each use. The higher their heart rate, the bigger their discount on a bottle of Ironage. The Pulse Machine challenged the competitive spirit of these athletes and turned them into word-of-mouth promoters of the brand as they compared their pulse readings.
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This ad campaign for The Art of Shaving Barber Spa, by ad agency BBDO New York, presents several key marketing messages in a single image. Caressing hands shape and give loving attention to every type of beard. The brand name itself “The Art of Shaving Barber Spa” implies that its men’s shaving and skin care products and shaving services are high-end and exclusive. Its wares are not cheap disposable razors that you buy by the dozen at Walmart.They are luxury items sought by men who go to aestheticians for a trim and wear subtly scented aftershave. Interestingly, Proctor & Gamble, which owns The Art of Shaving brand, isn’t named anywhere on the ads. The maker of snack foods, detergents, toilet paper, disposable diapers and teen-affordable beauty products sold in supermarkets, P&G knows that its reputation won’t add cachet to this line, but make it seem more ordinary.
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