thingy: Burger King's Latest Ad Failure

Wednesday, July 27, 2005

Burger King's Latest Ad Failure

Okay, failure-in-the-making. It's brand new, and time will tell. But come on. This is more of an attempt at a corporate image makeover, which makes it that much worse. Ahem...nowthen: Burger King has created a fake "theme" band named CoqRoq. (Quickly check out BK.com and you'll see how prominently the site is featured.) That's right, CoqRoq. The joke being that since about seven or eight people worldwide thought that their Subservient Chicken site was worth visiting twice, and its "star" was some dude in a rooster costume, that it must be a good idea to stretch the theme another mile and a half. CoqRoq, the official band of Burger King. If you don't believe me, check it out now, cuz I doubt it'll last long. Yes it's true, Burger King does indeed have an "extreme" and "in your face" mascot rock band named CoqRoq, and yes, Burger King's business is indeed food.

People are getting paid to conceive of this shit—paid well. Sack the ad agency. Sack the Coq. Sack the rest of the band. But the best part of this story is this...read this very brief article. Okay, so the statements were caused by "malfunctions in the Flash and XML programming". She must have assumed that she was addressing a world of luddites, cuz this is a dumb, blatant lie of the worst kind: the kind that assumes the rest of the world is dumb and will buy it, while the opposite is true. You don't have to be a Flash/XML whiz to know that "malfunctions" are not going to be caused by Flash or XML, at least not in this way. It's like saying "the construction of this house is faulty because of the hammers and nails."

Uh, no, Edna, SVP for global communications for Burger King, Esq., this was a malfunction of your judgment.

She's an idiot. Sack her.

Side note: I haven't had one in a long time, but I absolutely LOVE whoppers. I might even be inclined to go get one again if I were to see an ad that convinced me that I'd be glad I did. Maybe some meek little guy in the corner of the board room should raise his hand and suggest that they revisit the food-centric ad campaign used during their largest growth period, stop over-thinking its target demographic, and stop inaccurately pandering to them. Gee, maybe. (If you can't even pander effectively, how can you get giant corporate ad contracts? Someone? Anyone? Little help?

Update: One day later, the CoqRoq link is no longer a feature of the bk.com home page. You can still find their embarrassingly bad idea at coqroq.com.

On a Completely Unrelated Note...

It's time to put the space shuttle to bed and dream bigger dreams. It's curious that there hasn't been any talk about why we're still using this old clunky, expensive technology, more than 25 years after it was introduced, when there are so many cheaper, cleaner alternatives that have been beyond proof phase for years...? I hope this is the last shuttle flight. Time to turn it into a giant museum. Space exploration HO!, but let's upgrade the ship, huh guys?

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Labels: advertising

posted @ 7:58 PM

16 Comments:

Anonymous said...

Agree here. The world of advertising is full of phonies with no talent. I work for FC&B and can testify that 75% of all "creatives" in this business have no business in creative endeavors.

-MVC

6:47 PM

Guillome said...

She said that? wow what a liar. you are right.

1:33 PM

thk said...

funny, just last week i was thinking the same thing about the space shuffle.

5:24 AM

Andy B said...

Everyone knows that groupies love cock. What's the big deal? I have no problem with this.

Seriously, Burger King already makes Whoppers. A big piece of meat sandwiched between two firm buns. A band named after weener is pretty tame in comparison.

We are already numbed by the blatant sexual innuendo of Buger King marketing so how is more getting more penis shoved down our throats going to going to hurt anyone?

8:44 AM

Todd V said...

I actually *really* like all of the latest Burger King ads, including subservient chicken and all the strange ones with the paper mache king. I think it's funny as hell.

I don't know about the rest of the ads, but I went to high school with the guy who came up with the subservient chicken thing. He was really, really funny. Someone with a genuine original wit.

The ads and the things Burger King is doing is different enough from the norm to be entertaining.

I guess if I was in advertising, I'd have a hard time getting what I thought was funny on TV. Take the latest air freshener commercials. Everyone knows people use them to cover the smells of shit and fart in the bathroom. Why not run with that? I would.

10:52 AM

brandon said...

Todd, that's an amazing coincidence about your friend. I thought the big burger king head was too creepy for a food joint. I get the reason they did the subservient chicken - to get a buzz going online that wouldn't be a part of their ad campaign to the masses. It was still implemented poorly imo. It could have been funny but it was just a two minute novelty.

My problem with the coqroq idea is that it reeks of misunderstanding their intended target audience. I don't think it'll add a cent for them.

I wanna see an ad that reminds me why I loved whoppers. Forget all the peripheral crap. Tell me about the food.

11:15 AM

thk said...

bern. i think you need to have a little more respect for the word "food."

12:09 PM

Anonymous said...

WHAT THE fuck! COQROQ IT"S THE BEST FUCKIN COMERCIAL I"VE SEEN IN A LONG,LONG TIME THEY KICK SOME ASS! COQROQ KEEP DOING THE SHIT! IT"S GOOD DAMN COOL TO ME ME,I"M 36 YEARS AND THAT COMERCIAL IS THE BEST! BETTER THAN HOOTIE"S DUMB ASS.COQROQ ALL THE WAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

1:35 AM

Anonymous said...

To the original poster.
You are an idiot.
Apparently you have no sense of what it's like to be young, energetic, and extremely excited by any use of sexual inuendo.
This ad campaing is brilliant.
Get a life and quit blogging off.
You wish you were getting some of that lean white meat. :)~

2:14 PM

brandon said...

Bwa!

man, anon. Come out of your hiding so you can be rightfully thanked. This line is too perfect:

"Apparently you have no sense of what it's like to be young, energetic, and extremely excited by any use of sexual inuendo."

2:25 PM

Anonymous said...