Musée de la Publicité - "Advertising the Great Causes"

Today I visited the Museum of Advertising in Paris to see the exposition "Advertising the Great Causes". This expo covered advertising campaigns about drugs, alochol, AIDS, littering, the environment, human rights, poverty, arms, all of the Great Causes.

I think that this sector of advertising is one of the most difficult to produce. I recently worked on a Bollocks to Poverty (Action Aid) brief and had decided with my 'project partner' that we didn't want to guilt-trip our target audience. It is the obvious choice and is the choice that has been taken by many advertisers before us. I think it probably worked in the beginning but now the public has got fed up of hearing bad news and just shuts it out. Advertising for the great causes is having to be more creative and show matters in a less gloomy light.

Here are a few of the adverts I found the most interesting:

"Non-drinking water kills 8 million people a year in the world. Make the policies act by signing the petition at www.yourdropofwater.org"

"Chaque jour 15 personnes sont victimes du non-respect des feux - en ville, il n'y a pas que des voitures accidentées"
"Every day 15 people are victims of the non-respect of traffic lights - in town, it's not just the cars that are broken" - difficult to translate exactly...

Surfrider's Association ad showing a rubber glove flapping in the wind on a beach. It seemed to represent the sea/beach calling out for help.

"300,000 child soldiers dream of simply being children, www.amnesty.fr"
"300,000 enfants soldats rêvent simplement d'être enfants, www.amnesty.fr"
(Sorry for the window reflections in this pic!)

Sleepeater interactive music vid

Love this music vid! My guess is don't bother using it if your internet connection isn't great however. It's always good to see stuff done a bit different!

Google's fun side

I wasn't very impressed by Google's advertising for Chrome as I felt it was really boring however they have definately redeemed themselves with this viral video I love the idea, it's SO much more interesting than "Chrome is so amazing beacuse you can have 20 tabs open at the same time" (see below)



Google has never really had to make an effort to promote itself before now. It is the leading search engine - by miles. Now it's in competition with Internet Explorer, Firefox etc and it has had to make an effort. I think the "multiple tabs" campaign was a reflection of Google thinking it didn't really need to promote itself and could just rely on its no1 status.

The problem with promoting an internet browser is that not everyone knows what one is and most people probably don't care/realise which browser they are using anyway. Now they have launched their Speed Tests video i think people will see Google's more fun and human side whilst discovering that they can surf the internet more quickly by downloading chrome.

Definately a step in the right direction and currently featuring on BuzzFeed.com's Just Launched list.

Slice packaging

A really well designed set of packaging for an equally well thought-out brand.

Catch of the Day

Recently I watched this documentary on VBS. Since then I have done a lot of thinking about basically everything humans have done to the World. I'm not usually a hippy or anything but watch this and perhaps it will open your eyes too.

Below is an ad which basically sums it up. The campaign is called "Catch of the Day" by Saatchi and Saatchi New York for the Surfriders Foundation. The items where found "fresh" on a beach and show exactly what is happening to all of the plastic we use and throw away.

This is also the reason behind the Gorillaz latest album title : Plastic Beach

Visit to the Centre Pompidou

What better to do on the first sunday of the month than visit the Centre Pompidou in Paris? I felt a bit like a fly as I walked round because I found my self attracted by anything with neon lighting. Looking at all the art and stuff kind of made me question whether the things I saw were genuinely "works of art" or just a pretty picture/installation or a load of rubbish.
There was one piece that I did like however, below, but merely for its aesthetic qualities and simple but nice interactivity.

If tree is to birds nest, then the Pompidou centre is to.....? Tree houses =) They're a bit pointless but i like them.It has to be said one of the best things about the pompidou centre is the view. Panoramic view of Paris including the Notre Dame cathedral, Eiffel Tower and the Sacre Coeur.

So I wasn't very impressed by the "art" but I did stop by the book shop and spent at least half an hour flicking through the 2009's D&AD Award Winners book. I have been watching some of the interviews with the judges so it was interesting to see the work they picked. Maybe I'll do another post about that...

Put me to the test!

Instead of looking through my portfolio I ask you to set me a design challenge.

Whether you're stuck on a strapline, have put off commissioning a logo design or just fancy seeing what today's students are capable of - give me a brief and a deadline and let's put me to the test!

Advertising agency - Curb

I really like this agency's ethos and the fact that they have created a natural, glow-in-the-dark fungus! Every piece of work that they produce is environmentally friendly - i think we should all take a leaf out of their book!

Pixel Invasion

This is a really cute vid - but it does bring up quite an interesting subject - perhaps that of whether we now don't need to go out (use the metro, drive cars, work in offices...) because we can do everything on our computers, over the net. In fact, the video even starts with someone throwing out an old (analogue) television.

Guerilla Advertising

Check out this "The 80 Best Guerilla Marketing Ideas I’ve Ever Seen" Article