"Let's All Go To The Lobby" Is As Complicated As Advertisements Should Get
please, stop trying to relate to me, i beg
I recently watched a YouTube documentary on the history of advertising in Chicago. I will give a crisp five-dollar bill high-five to the first person in the comment section who can guess why I was watching a YouTube documentary on the history of advertising in Chicago.
Nonetheless, it got me thinking [which none of us here should be rooting for]. At first pass, I was very struck by the charmingly naïve nature of the advertising industry up until about the 1980s. I was even further struck by how gullible openminded people were that the charmingly naïve advertising industry managed to be so successful. One of the examples that highlights this well is the case of United Airlines, which, apparently, had a “brand issue.” You see, the aeroplane was new-fangled mode of transportation for your common, upstanding, everyday citizen. And gee whiz, was that scary! All those signs and lines and gate numbers! It’s enough to dizzy the senses of a simple country gal like me. How in the world is poor old United Airlines supposed to convey their trustworthy, neighborly nature to all those lovely, simple people?
Well, with their absolutely hulkin’ noggins and jazzed salaries that will out-earn what I make in my entire lifetime [possibly without even adjusting for inflation… placing bets now], the Big-Brained Brand Boys of the Windy City cracked the case: “how’s abouts we tell ‘em them skies is friendly!”
Boom! A gagillion dollar ad campaign is born: “Fly the friendly skies.” Well I’ll be darned to heck if that doesn’t assuage all my trepidations right there! I’m ready to board me an aeroplane bound for the Atlantic Coast to see my ma!
In my second edition of “Classic Rock Songs I Love,” I noted how I would enjoy going back in time to the recording session for Gimme Shelter. Scratch that. We have a new wish. I would simply loveeeee to go back in time and give the advertising agencies a real PR problem to deal with. You see, occasionally, we now make phones that explode. Or some website gets hacked and now every computer knows exactly what I might be craving at 10:23pm on a Monday night [dear computer, the answer is bleu cheese, let’s fuckin go]. Who wins in a fight: a Boeing 737 MAX vs. “our airline is super nice pinky promise!” Lmao.
Now, after that fun little thought experiment, during which I genuinely made myself chortle several times out loud, I did have a second thought [whoa!]. My second thought is that maybe those little midwestern-innocence weenies had a point. Their whole Thing was funny little dancing cartoon characters - think the Jolly Green Giant [awesome, even if peas are gross], Tony the Tiger [still dope, even if we didn’t need help selling sugar bomb cereal to kids], or my pal, Poppin’ Fresh [their tubes of triple-bleached goo are responsible for my robust physique]. And maybe, just maybe, that’s the way advertising should be.
For my money - and there isn’t very much of it - the peak advertisement ever made is “Let’s All Go to the Lobby.” In the process of writing this blog my editor has informed me that this may not be a wholly universal reference [kids these days don’t know squat about nothing], so let me provide the video here for those of you who have somehow missed out on educating yourselves of cultural icons:
That was fun, right! The little soda and popcorn danced! They sang! They sold you products! I know I want some popcorn after watching that. In fact, I wanna sink my teeth into that anthropomorphized popcorn buckets brains like a freshly minted zombie. That’s the power of advertising.
From a technical point of view, “Let’s All Go to the Lobby” is a masterclass. Consider the Five Ws: Who What When Where Why… I have provided a handy diagram below. Please read it over, as there will be a quiz.
Just like that, I’ve learned everything I need to know about this good and/or service! Do I care if the movie theater popcorn has exploding kernels with non-trivial quantities of cyanide inside? Not really. Do I care if the dancing soda relates to my struggles as 26-year-old woman with four jobs? Nopers. Do I care if the candy is packaged by tiny, kidnapped men in a factory run by a maniac? Not all that much. This commercial didn’t address my concerns, no; this commercial didn’t even acknowledge that there were any concerns to be had! The commercial barely addresses me at all! I have been thoroughly distracted, dazzled, delighted... I am far too swept up in those charming, effervescent little characters to give a damn whether AMC Theater is installing an electric shock in my seat for when I return from the lobby, oh, the wonderful lobby!
Modern advertising is too concerned with both problems AND solutions.
“Oooo this thing is gonna kill you, so look over here instead!”
“Oooo this thing is gonna save you, so don’t look away!”
I don’t care! Show me the adorable cartoon! I want to see a little mascot doing a jig. I want to see a rotund creature from the woods put yummy things in its mouth. I don’t want to learn any information [generally speaking, but also in this context]. Dear Advertisers, I’m so ready to give you five dollars if you’d just shut up and let me watch a monkey peddle a banana.
I think if I drill down to the root of this issue, modern advertising is just so smarmy. Ads now are really selling me a lifestyle, a relationship with their brand. Disrespectfully, no thank you! You don’t run a blog with tens of subscribers; you cannot relate to my level of fame and acclaim. I am nearly maxed out on my personal capacity for friendship, and I’m not wasting an ounce of that capacity feeling weird kinship towards the dude trying to convince me to doordash my dinner while I’m trying to watch Frasier. Fundamentally, I’m just not interested in having your product attempt to relate to me in any way. Anyone working on an advertisement bigger than a 3am spot on the local cable channel is simply not going to come across as 1) genuine, 2) interesting, 3) helpful, or 4) funny. By demanding I have a positive image of their brand, the advertisers are now forced to curate that image, hence the overemphasis on both problems and solutions. They can’t just let the phone explode in peace; they have to make sure I’ve fallen so deeply in love with the product’s Way of Life that I’ve forgotten it might explode at all. It’s more work for all of us; it’s exhausting for all of us; and it ruins Superbowl Sunday, a cardinal sin.
So, what did I learn from watching my decennial documentary? I learned that, while it would be side-splittingly hilarious to watch a Michigan Avenue executive from 1949 spin their wheels dealing with the BP oil spill [ten bux that it would get rebranded as a ‘sticky situation’], I am ultimately not so different from those bygone days. I, too, just want us all to go to the lobby to buy ourselves a treat. Advertisements should drop the whole Useful-And-Relatable schtick and go back to Useless-But-Goofy-As-Hell. Hey, it’s worked out for me so far.
Katie’s Blogs: They’reeee Great!
Some of us reading the blog today are new here [fresh growth on an aged stump], and some of us are very, very old [the strong center rings in our growing stump]. Either way, I’m sure most of you have gleaned that I mayhaps may quite possibly not be the most “contentious consumer.” But quite frankly, I don’t think I need to be. Many generations of my ancient ancestors probably survived by eating frozen mud and cleaning fish with rocks and their bare hands. I’m largely making that up, but it still feels probably true… I feel it in my ancestral bones.
Point is, we’ve earned the right to be slightly lazier and more trustworthy. Sure, my so-called smart car might get hacked and strand me at any moment, but like, it’s probably not gonna happen. And sure, the lady in the Ikea ad looks so happy in her trendy hygge home with her two dogs and cup of tea clutched at the chest, but I’m probably not going to suddenly evolve my decorating taste from clown-car-interior to beige-and-navy-is-so-cute. Ergo, I do not need my advertisements to be the length of a football field and full of Facts and Disclaimers and Very Fit 20-Somethings Telling Me How Great Their Life Is, okay? I’ll be fine. You’ll be fine. It’s not like any of us are using that information, anyway. You’re here, which means self-improvement and self-respect are not your priorities. So let’s take the advertisements down a notch, and let’s all go to the lobby and finally get our damn treat.
One last thing - I’m going to end this blog the only way I feel is appropriate: peddling a shitton of my own advertisements because hey, here at The Stump, we are ultimately all about the brand.
dazzled by my unrelenting wit and wisdom? you can finance my caffeine and alcohol consumption that keeps this stone rolling uphill. also, i’ll be immeasurably grateful and possibly weep.
So one of my favorites is “I wish I were an Oscar Meyer weiner...”. It actually makes me want to eat a hot dog (generally, ick), which I never want to do unless (1) it’s July 4th and I’m in the town park in Lake City, CO watching old-time foot races, shoe kicks, and egg tosses, (2) it’s covered in cornmeal and fried at the Fletcher’s corny dog stand at the State Fair of Texas in Dallas, or (3) I’m at a ballpark watching the Texas Rangers beat any team (but especially the Houston Astros). So, yes, your advertising point is a good one. 😉
in the uk we had an advert for the car insurance company called 'Go Compare' and it was about a huge opera singer whose whole thing was that everyone HATED HIM. like, he would turn up and sing about car insurance and people would hate it. eventually they killed him off in an advert and it was honestly the most unnerving thing. i think they brought him back but yeah. thats the kind of advertising i can abide.