WARNING: EGREGIOUS VIOLATION OF “THE PEPSI RULE” AHEAD:
For those of you unaware of the Jimmy John’s Gourmet Sandwiches franchise, their TV ads are at best vapid, stupid, and/or infantile.
If I ever meet the person who authorised this TV ad, I’m going to say, “Hey, I’ve always wanted to meet you,” and then punch him square in the nose for polluting the tranquility of my home to say nothing of forcing a waste of air time on the public with such moronic idiocy. It’s not even funny. Although I think it’s supposed to be. To someone, anyway. Although I couldn’t imagine who that would be except some brainless legbreaker’s character from The Sopranos.
Yes, I don’t have to watch it. No, I shouldn’t not have to. Put that in your sub and eat it.
Your Ptahhotep quote should be modified to reflect your distaste for that franchise. But keep the bit about winelessness being bad.
It’s late and I’m goin to bed but I’ll watch the clip tomorrow and express my opinion. I already have a bad feeling…anyone who gives such a podunk name to their business is bound to make other bad decisions.
I won’t argue the name; it’s the original owner’s, a Lithuanian expat who made good. It is what it is. You have to agree it’s got a ring to it. Could be worse, right?
As for the rest of it, I’d be surprised if they haven’t lost business for their latest marketing attempts.
Quizno’s has bloody peppers? Ew. Now I know I’m never going there.
But I don’t think I’ve seen those ads of which you speak, Red. Maybe they are California-specific or something? Here in loverly Minnesota we get the Us-vs.-Them shtick, but all we really see is Them: represented by a bespectacled, affable, dorky college-student type at the till, as if that in itself were a liability. One of their lines is a clumsily conceived thing about how you can get a better French Dip sandwich at Quizno’s…cue to the “competition’s” hapless rep waving nicely at you…“without the dip.” Terrible, really.
It is patent, Quizno’s, that you are whoring yourself out to The Beautiful People, and I tell you the bees of revolution will not lose your scent.
Well, aren’t you in for a treat. That would be these. Live dangerously; play the clip.
I’d like to say that the aether has been a slightly less desperate place since the noisome Spongemonkeys went away. But then… I saw the ad you posted, and knew despair.
Mercifully, Windows won’t let me play the file. But I read the article, and I have to say that for these fellas…
…I am probably in all three camps (“What are these creatures?”, “You gotta be kidding”, and “This is genius advertising!”) equally, absenting an actual viewing. Please don’t throw things at me. I do have a soft spot for some bad taste.
And I see that I’ve been inserting an apostrophe where it doesn’t belong. I promise to stop that from now on. “Quiznos” (note my making good on my word) it shall be, then.
It’s like a cartoon entertainment for psychopathic toddlers. I dread that this may well be art to come. O tempora. O mores.
In refrence to the ad that started this thread: yes, it’s awful. But! Prior to now I was not aware of the existance of Jimmy John’s franchise. I hadn’t even heard of it. Now I have. What does that say about the effectiveness of the ad?
Yes. I’ve heard that argument a lot. …but it makes you remember the ad!..
I don’t know about that.
Some ads I remember …you know that ad where the hyperactive baby rides his bouncy chair up the wall?.. but I can’t begin to tell you what it was advertising.
Then there are those that I do remember the advertisers (a couple chain jewelry stores come to mind,) but I so detest their theme songs that I wouldn’t go there even if I liked mainstream adornment.
I am probably the worst consumer test subject you could find, otoh, as the moment I enter a mall (designed, one assumes, to maximize your tendency to want to empty your pockets) I have a sort of aversion reaction, want to leave, and begin to feel even more tightwadly than I did when I entered.
It’s got people talking about sandwiches, circulating the name of the franchise (of which I had never heard 'til now). The way it’s done, the name does stick in memory.
My father was Creative Director and Director of Marketing Communications Planning at a major ad agency. He often said the most effective advertising sometimes needs to be a little grating to break through the background noise and make an impression. It’s a well tested fact that people liking or disliking an ad has no correlation with whether the ad sells product. The management at Charmin hated the Mr. Whipple/Don’t squeeze the Charmin ads (as did the public), but every time they changed the advertising, sales went down.
What an excellent commercial! Thx for pointing it out, Nano. It runs the whole gamut of human emotion, and perhaps that’s something you were not prepared for: the cry of victory, the cry of terror, the cry of defeat, the cry of dehand, the smile of just having got some, and all ending up buried in someone else’s buns. What more could you ask of a tv commercial? And they’ve got it all crammed into one 30 second sandwich. Brilliant!
Actually, they have pretty good bread, which means more to me
than any ad. I think the most egregious crime is that they stole the
while-falling-stop-screaming-to-take-a-breath gag from Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey (which probably, in turn, stole it from someone
else). I guess falling is a better excuse for screaming at you than the
usual excuse (to whit: “Because I’m a used car salesman”).
