In the annals of American advertising, some of the best commercials and some of the worst have been the kind the executives who foot the bills love best: straightforward product demonstrations.
Since the first days of TV advertising in the 1950s, companies have tried to prove their brands were stronger, faster, more effective, softer or otherwise superior to the competition. Kids who grew up on M&Ms bought them after learning they “melt in your mouth, not in your hand,” thanks to demonstrations using spotless white gloves. OFF! insect repellent made its point by showing a human arm thrust into a screened cage of swarming mosquitos-before and after the OFF! application.
Rolaids commercials simulated a scientific look by using a beaker containing what was purported to be stomach acid. When Rolaids were dropped into the container, they absorbed “47 times” their weight in acid, and the liquid turned clear.
The Rolaids spot of the ’50s probably could not stand up to the rigors of examination required of commercial demonstrations today. Most consumer-products marketers test and retest their demos to make sure they are defensible under the scrutiny of a maligned competitor or the regulations of the Federal Trade Commission.
But one of the latest commercials in the genre came not out of the laboratories of a corporate giant but from the sewing room of the wife of the spot’s art director.
In the 30-second spot that began airing nationally in mid-August, a young woman stitches a delicate blue-and-white pillow from the Kleenex tissues on her sewing table. The viewer is amazed that tissues don’t shred to pieces as they move under the sewing machine needle.
Art director Jim Shirreff’s assignment was to show that the newest generation of Kleenex is thicker and softer. He and his copywriter partner, Jay Dandy of Foote, Cone & Belding in Chicago, mulled the question, “What is the gold standard for facial tissue?” Shirreff said. “We thought about what do you compare yourself to? A big, fluffy quilt, cotton, or a handkerchief, which is of course the reason there is Kleenex.”
One idea was to visually compare the new Kleenex to a handkerchief by sewing a border on it. “My wife is a seamstress,” Shirreff said, “and she had taken a class where you make a master pattern out of tissue. We were here on a Saturday morning working on this thing, and I thought, what if you sewed on this stuff?”
Shirreff took the box home, and his wife, Maureen, who also is a free-lance art director, essentially created the spot. First, she sewed a red border around the tissue, like a fancy handkerchief. Then, with other tissues, she put in a zipper and made a miniature pillowcase.
Shirreff brought the samples to the agency, and he and his partner developed the commercial around the pillow idea. After presenting more traditional commercials, they pulled out the home-sewn creations.
“You could see the light bulbs going off” in the heads of the people assembled around the conference table, Shirreff said. The key was that an everyday product was treated in an unexpected way.
Let’s hope that if Kleenex sales take off, Maureen Shirreff gets her share of the bonuses.
