Marcellus Howard, Andrew Lewis & Monique Swallow (Colgate)
This ad for Colgate Shaving Cream is stylized and impressionistic. The overly dramatic comic-book illustrations tell a story while giving you information about Colgate. The large photo of the product at the bottom with the price of 25 cents in the large text, reminds you of the price and it reminds you of the time period of the ad. In the ad, the comic plays into the Matador theme and depicts the product as a peacemaker between a man and his oily jacket.
The Colgate ad overtly tries to be funny. The Matador adds more comedic value by not trying to depict the everyday man. The claims in the ad are that, there is a tough oily waterproof jacket that makes whiskers tough to handle. Colgate Shaving Cream claims it will "emulsify" the oil. In the ad, they make a radical appeal, as the duck gives the Matador advice. They try and make logical appeals by making semi-scientific bubbles claims. Most of the rational arguments are at the end of the text next to the cheap price of the shaving cream.
2 comments:
I think this ad goes well with the times. Keeping yourself clean shaven was probably not on the top of the list of things to do daily. The duck says the matador’s manly whiskers are waterproof like his back and giving him a reason why it is so hard to shave. Instead of pulling hairs out or scraping them off, the Colgate will de-water proof them for a much easier shave. The ten cent price change might have got a reader’s attention and convinced him that 25 cents wasn’t a bad price to pay to stay shaved.
I think this ad is catching because of its use of humor. So many ads now-a-days use humor to cut through the clutter, and I think this Colgate ad did a good job of cutting through other hard-sell ads of its kind. It still has the long article that one would have to read in order to get the full effect of the advertisement, but I think most who flip through the pages of wherever this print ad was would stop to think, "what?" and then have to investigate.
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