Paging Jim Stengel.
You wouldn’t approve of this garbage, would you?
In case you have no clue who Jim Stengel is, this legendary marketer served as Procter & Gamble Co.‘s Global Marketing Officer until fall 2008, when he spoke in Orlando, Fla. at the ANA Masters of Marketing Conference and announced his “retirement.”
Back then, P&G — as it is today — was the No. 1 advertiser in both Hispanic media and non-Hispanic media.
A plethora of P&G brands dominated Hispanic print, Hispanic TV and Hispanic digital.
That’s why the June 29 launch of P&G brand Old Spice‘s latest campaign — Smell ‘Em Who’s Boss — is so alarming and insulting to multicultural advertising and marketing professionals.
This marketing campaign, developed by Portland, Ore.-based Wieden+Kennedy, “humorously” illustrates the “transformational” powers of Old Spice Swagger and Desperado scents, in addition to Old Spice Hair (Shampoo), putting guys in the driver’s seat of pure unadulterated confidence.
As the scent of confidence, anything is possible with Old Spice.
This evidently includes bad spots.
My latest Red Card goes to Old Spice, which joins Tecate in providing “insult my consumer” creative.
Like Tecate, this spot was created and produced by mainly non-Latinos. With the Old Spice spots we have — count ’em — one Latino: Assistant Editor Zaldy Lopez.
Old Spice excitedly introduced the spots by noting that two of the four spots seek to target Hispanic millennials and introduces the first Mexican actor to be featured in an Old Spice spot — Alberto Cardenas.
Hear those crickets chirping? Me too.
We’ve done some research and we can firm that this individual is not the Alberto Cardenas who serves as a partner in the law firm of Squire Patton Boggs and in the Advocacy Group at Cardenas Partners.
This Alberto Cardenas is also not the former governor of Jalisco, Mexico and PAN Senator until his 2012 departure from politics.
Aside from a Google search that shows he may be a Mexican model, I’ve never heard of this guy.
To view the “hilarious and surreal” Desperado spot featuring Mr. Cardenas, click here: Wieden+Kennedy Old Spice Spot
This will be gracing the airwaves this summer, and we certainly hope that the budget put toward this did not reduce any sort of effort targeting Hispanics who consume Spanish-language media. If so, that would be a hugely disconcerting move and send a very wrong message to all CMOs, brand managers, media buyers and media planners.
This is not Hispanic advertising. This is a spot that seems perfectly geared to young men who enjoy watching Spike or similar “tune in, turn off and vegetate” television networks.
In late July I’ll be in Portland and I’m tempted to drop a Red Card in the lobby for Creative Director Max Stinson, or perhaps another one of the W+K team such as Client Contact Janine Miletec.
But maybe they aren’t the ones that deserve the Red Card. Perhaps it is the successor to James Moorhead, who departed as CMO for Old Spice in spring 2012 to become CMO for Dish Network and can now be found at Metromile, which is “revolutionizing” the car insurance experience with pay-per-mile pricing. Or, is it the successor to John Sebastian, who exited as P&G Marketing Director-North America Personal Care in September 2015 to join Newell Rubbermaid as VP/GM?
Whoever the new “wolf dog” is running the marketing for Old Spice better sit and learn a new trick, because Desperado is a desperate attempt to effectively attract the Latino consumer.
Yes, JC Harvey. We’re talking to you.
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