Reports From The Lush Culture
SAUCE THERAPY
This Week's Guest Columnist: Lucia T.
Advertising's not a bad thing. Neither is alcohol. But given America's puritanical heritage, advertising for alcohol has always been viewed with suspicion by high-ranking pleasure-haters. After Prohibition-- can you believe that anybody ever tried to outlaw liquor? they must have been on drugs to think they could do it!-- beer and wine ads sneaked back into the media, but the hard liquor industry had a tougher time, observing a self-imposed ban on radio and then TV advertising.
Did you realize that ban was voluntary? A lot of people don't. Well, it was voluntary, but happily the ban was dropped in 1996 and ads for vodka, gin, whiskey, and other spirits have been sneaking onto TV. The ads appear on local stations, during appropriate time slots, aimed at appropriate audiences, of course-- meaning late-night, adults-only. According to the New York TImes, more than 100 local television stations in nearly 90 markets have agreed to take Seagram's advertising." The Times also reports that ads for a brand much loved around Platform offices, Jack Daniels, have appeared in Miami, Las Vegas, and other local markets, on NBC, Fox, and CBS, during shows like "E.R." and "West Wing." So while most cable and network TV channels still carry no liquor ads, it's only a matter of time before they all do, nationally, for several reasons:
1) Beer and wine have enjoyed an unfair advantage.
Hard liquor manufacturers have always complained loudly that they're at a competitive disadvantage, without the kind of TV and radio advertising that beer and wine can do, and they're right. Liquor is no "dirtier" than wine and beer. If we associate gin with flopping alone in hallways of inner city, single-room-occupancy hotels and wine with hosting dinner-tables of dear friends on warm, sophisticated evenings in beautifully restored, vintage suburban homes, then it's because we've gotten suckered into a fantasy. The reality is that dissolute alcoholics come from both sides of the tracks and are likely to drink anything.
2) TV needs ad revenues.
Media outlets have never been more strapped for advertising revenue, especially the so-called minority media, which have been misunderstood or overlooked by many advertisers. The spread of liquor advertising is gonna be great for minority media. Sure, racist marketers have traditionally exploited alcoholism (and tobacco addiction!) in minority communities by seducing consumers with "sophisticated lifestyle" ads. But nowadays everybody's waking up to those growing numbers of increasingly affluent (and intelligent!) urban consumers, so it's a sure bet that liquor advertisers have their eyes on the WB and UPN.
3) People like fun commercials.
In print, liquor ads have been pretty creative. In the attempt to get away from the negative "drink and you'll get drunk" message, many advertising creative directors have pioneered genius campaigns, like the famous conceptual one that marketing legend Michel Roux did for Absolut. Can you imagine how much fun a 30-second TV spot for a liquor brand would be if done as a mini film noir or a mini hiphop music video?
Of course, when liquor does arrive on mainstream TV it will be in ads that have been created and deployed with conspicuous responsibility. Models and actors will clearly be over 21 (or over 25, as is currently promised by Allied Domecq, which have TV campaigns for Kahlua, Crown Royal, and Chivas); targetted audiences will also be older; time slots will be late-prime time to late-night. And you know what? I think we'll manage to respond to these ads just as responsibly and not immediately go out and gulp ourselves into a vomit-laced blackout.
This Week's Guest Columnist: Lucia T.
Advertising's not a bad thing. Neither is alcohol. But given America's puritanical heritage, advertising for alcohol has always been viewed with suspicion by high-ranking pleasure-haters. After Prohibition-- can you believe that anybody ever tried to outlaw liquor? they must have been on drugs to think they could do it!-- beer and wine ads sneaked back into the media, but the hard liquor industry had a tougher time, observing a self-imposed ban on radio and then TV advertising.
Did you realize that ban was voluntary? A lot of people don't. Well, it was voluntary, but happily the ban was dropped in 1996 and ads for vodka, gin, whiskey, and other spirits have been sneaking onto TV. The ads appear on local stations, during appropriate time slots, aimed at appropriate audiences, of course-- meaning late-night, adults-only. According to the New York TImes, more than 100 local television stations in nearly 90 markets have agreed to take Seagram's advertising." The Times also reports that ads for a brand much loved around Platform offices, Jack Daniels, have appeared in Miami, Las Vegas, and other local markets, on NBC, Fox, and CBS, during shows like "E.R." and "West Wing." So while most cable and network TV channels still carry no liquor ads, it's only a matter of time before they all do, nationally, for several reasons:
1) Beer and wine have enjoyed an unfair advantage.
Hard liquor manufacturers have always complained loudly that they're at a competitive disadvantage, without the kind of TV and radio advertising that beer and wine can do, and they're right. Liquor is no "dirtier" than wine and beer. If we associate gin with flopping alone in hallways of inner city, single-room-occupancy hotels and wine with hosting dinner-tables of dear friends on warm, sophisticated evenings in beautifully restored, vintage suburban homes, then it's because we've gotten suckered into a fantasy. The reality is that dissolute alcoholics come from both sides of the tracks and are likely to drink anything.
2) TV needs ad revenues.
Media outlets have never been more strapped for advertising revenue, especially the so-called minority media, which have been misunderstood or overlooked by many advertisers. The spread of liquor advertising is gonna be great for minority media. Sure, racist marketers have traditionally exploited alcoholism (and tobacco addiction!) in minority communities by seducing consumers with "sophisticated lifestyle" ads. But nowadays everybody's waking up to those growing numbers of increasingly affluent (and intelligent!) urban consumers, so it's a sure bet that liquor advertisers have their eyes on the WB and UPN.
3) People like fun commercials.
In print, liquor ads have been pretty creative. In the attempt to get away from the negative "drink and you'll get drunk" message, many advertising creative directors have pioneered genius campaigns, like the famous conceptual one that marketing legend Michel Roux did for Absolut. Can you imagine how much fun a 30-second TV spot for a liquor brand would be if done as a mini film noir or a mini hiphop music video?
Of course, when liquor does arrive on mainstream TV it will be in ads that have been created and deployed with conspicuous responsibility. Models and actors will clearly be over 21 (or over 25, as is currently promised by Allied Domecq, which have TV campaigns for Kahlua, Crown Royal, and Chivas); targetted audiences will also be older; time slots will be late-prime time to late-night. And you know what? I think we'll manage to respond to these ads just as responsibly and not immediately go out and gulp ourselves into a vomit-laced blackout.
posted by Lucia Toledo at 9:55 AM
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