Or, Kelley’s Love Letter to Madison Avenue
 Have you seen that vile commercial for the single-dose version of a
children's allergy medicine? The one where Loser Mom and Smug Mom are sitting
on a park bench, and Smug saves the day by letting Loser borrow one of her
single-dose packages? Isn't it just wonderful the way they pit mother against
mother like that, in a contest of parenting skills? The way they exploit every
mother's fear that she's not doing this right, and also the way they play right
into her detail-management fatigue? All in just thirty seconds.
Before I had children, I used to be an art director in some pretty
fancy-schmancy New York advertising agencies, let me tell you, so I have a
pretty good idea of how this travesty came into being.
It all starts with a directive from the manufacturer (a.k.a. the "Client").
They ask their ad agency to create a TV "spot" that introduces their new
product. The ad agency account executives (the suits) meet with the client and
try to determine what the client wants to "say" with the new spot. Besides just
"buy this crap now," that is. What are the selling points? What makes this
product great? How does this product differ from all the identical products
already out there? Together with the client they determine a "strategy."
Then the suits go back to the agency, hole up in an office, send some shlub
out for coffee, and write a "brief." The brief is a document that outlines the
whole project and gives directions to the "creatives." The "creatives" means
the art director/copywriter team that will come up with the ideas for the words
and pictures, basically.
They write a brief that is full of enough marketing-speak to satisfy the
client, but has enough vagueness to completely confuse the creatives.
Creative Brief
Client: Johnson & Merck
Product: "Benny and the Jets" Children's Allergy
Single-dose Plastic Squirty Thingys (Working Title)
Job Name: Product Intro/30 second spot
Account Team: M.B.A. McClueless, Up N. Coming, Wide-eyed
Newcomer, Intern McClientskid.
Creative Team: Overworked N. Underpaid, Freshoutta
Artskuule, Jaded McArtsyfartsy, Wantstobee A. Realwriter
Strategy: This revolutionary single-serving dose pack
design offers convenience, portability and moral salvation to the harried
mothers of the world. The successful ad will focus on the "drop in your bag and
go" idea, as that was an overwhelmingly positive factor in focus groups (see
attached focus group summary document: Depressed Des Moines Moms React to
J&M's New Product Packaging, p 238).
More feedback from the focus groups indicated that mothers have a secret
fear of being perceived as "loser moms" who "don't have their shit together,"
so let's play on this as we develop our commercial.
Next Steps: Three separate concepts should be developed by
the above creative team, none of whom have children or have even smelled a
diaper, and should be ready for presentation to the above account team, none of
whom have any children or have even smelled a diaper, no later than tomorrow
morning.
The suits present the brief to the creatives. The creatives get pissed off,
because this means that any plans they might have had for the evening are shot
to hell. The suits then go out for drinks, and the creatives shlump dejectedly
back to their offices to call significant others and tell them that they will
be working late.
They order up some deli/Chinese/Indian (pick one) and a bunch of Red Bulls
and go to work. Jaded McArtsyfartsy throws darts at his ironic Simpsons
dartboard in a mixture of self-awareness and catatonia as he discusses what
motivates today's mother with Wantstobee A. Realwriter, who is sprawled out on
the office couch, which is upholstered in an ironic vintage fifties cowboy
pattern. They try to determine what kind of language and concept will appeal to
their target audience.
"Today's mother is driven to excellence by competition. She enjoys being
shown a better way by other mothers, and she would never feel resentful of
this. She thinks she has it easy and loves spending every minute of her life
managing her children's lives. She feels completely fulfilled if their success
at preschool comes at the expense of every goal and hope she has ever had for
herself."
"How do you know? Do you know any mothers?"
"What effing difference does that make? I see enough of them and their
demon-seed brats every day at Starbucks."
"You're right. So, our concept has to make mothers feel guilty because
they don't have enough to feel guilty about in today's parenting culture and
that will spur them to buy this product."
"Precisely... right on."
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