 |
| 等 级：资深长老 |
| 经 验 值：5855 |
| 魅 力 值：3513 |
| 龙 币：12359 |
| 积 分：7806.2 |
| 注册日期：2002-04-15 |
| |
|
|
|
'Sex Sells, Absolutly, in the City' 8月18日阅读, 美联社~
Sex Sells, Absolut-ly, in the City
August 18, 2003
In a plot line of this season's "Sex and the City," the character of Samantha lands her love interest a modeling gig that ends up as a skyscraper-sized billboard in Times Square. In the ad, a bottle of Absolut vodka acts as a modernized fig leaf for the ad's otherwise nude subject, who appears above the tagline "Absolut Hunk."
Talk about your strategic product placement.
But this wasn't your typical product-placement deal. In a departure from the norm, it was the HBO show's producers who approached Manhattan-based Absolut Spirits about using the vodka on the show, not the other way around. And instead of the series' producers deciding how to use the Absolut brand and simply getting the company's OK, it was the spirit maker's creative team that designed the provocative ad, which depicted actor Jason Lewis - in a state of undress that would warrant a PG-13 rating were it a movie - in a classic 1970s beefcake pose above the tagline.
In the show, Samantha (Kim Cattrall), a publicist, arranges for her lover, who's also a struggling actor, to appear in the ad, which soon sparks the first flickers of fame. The show's producers were looking for a brand whose campaign was instantly recognizable and simple enough so that a brief mention would be sufficient to drive home the intended point - hence, Absolut, said the spirit company's vice president of marketing, Jim Goodwin.
The company is known for its distinctive print ads, which almost always incorporate either an Absolut bottle or its silhouette and a tagline bearing the vodka's name. For example, an ad with the tagline "Absolute Apple" shows a gridlocked Manhattan street with yellow taxis forming the bottle's shape, or "Absolut Peak," which depicts a mountainside's ski slopes resembling the outline of a bottle. Other ads, including the fake one from the show, can be found at 该网址不再展示 />
The hunk ad was more risque than something Absolut normally would produce, but the company jumped at the chance, because the "Sex" audience is exactly the market the spirits firm tries to reach anyway, he said.
"It's very different from a lot of things we've done," Goodwin said. "Every once in a while you need to take a risk and that's what the show offered us, the chance to do something different with the brand. We made the decision pretty quickly."
The ad was designed by the Manhattan office of TBWA/Chiat/Day, Absolut's ad agency, whose group creative director, Patrick O'Neill, is a fan of the show. The ad, which also appears on a bus shelter and on postcards in the show, was produced practically the same way as a real Absolut ad, with the agency showing the series' producers a few concepts based on the "Absolut Hunk" tagline, O'Neill said.
For the pose that eventually became the fictitious ad, O'Neill said he thought of the outdated word "hunk" and pictured the 1972 Cosmopolitan centerfold of Burt Reynolds stretched out naked on a bearskin rug, or the female equivalent: the cheesecake Farrah Fawcett swimsuit poster from the 1970s. That's when the agency decided to go for a '70s feel for the ad.
Aside from creating a recipe for a drink called Absolut Hunk, the spirits company has no plans to recreate the ad in any form. But that hasn't stopped "Sex" fans from asking O'Neill for a copy.
"That's what made it so nice that they took a chance," O'Neill said. "There was a lot of integrity in the way it was done."
(此文由远离尘嚣在2003-08-18 21:09:49编辑过)
|
|
--
long arm of coincidence here~
 |
|
|
2003-08-18 21:09:11
