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But still they come - thick, and fast.
Hey DG, hope you are well... Thought I would drop you a line about our coming launch in London. The events are going to be pretty unique, with the customer having to pay nothing. Anyway let us know if you want to follow up with me on this? Best, aaron
Aaron's sent me one of the most hyperbole-stuffed PR emails I've received all year, which I thought I'd share with you. So as not to promote the expensive luxury product he represents, I'm going to replace the name of his brand with the word Silage, his market sector with custard, his agency with the word Muckspreader and his campaign title with Stench. Other words may also have been replaced for concealment purposes.
SILAGE custard appoint Muckspreader to launch STENCH™ SILAGE is set to launch its first consumer campaign in the UK. The <foreign> custard brand has developed a cult following in the UK amongst the top end custard-trade, built on the back of its seminal Custard World Cup. SILAGE is created near a world benchmark for air purity and takes its name from the factory location, <factory location>. Targeted at the premium custard market, the brand is looking to become a staple of both the on and off-trade markets across the UK. In addition to SILAGE Pure custard, the brand has a range of flavoured variants: <fodder>, <slime>, <manure> & <gunk>.
Aaron has made two crucial mistakes. Firstly, to assume that I might be coerced into promoting his premium custard. And secondly, that what he's written in his speculative email is somehow inherently interesting.
The new campaign, ‘STENCH™’, has been created by Muckspreader and gives a unique <foreign> take on SILAGE’s purity story: utilizing the line “Stench in the air, Stench in the water, STENCH™ in the custard”. The campaign will launch with experiential, social & in-store activity, with consumers given the chance to pay for SILAGE with ‘Stench’. The payment method will change every week & will be only be found on the brand’s Facebook page (www.facebook.com/Silage).
You'd have to live in a bubble to assume that anyone outside PR world is excited by the promise of "experiential, social & in-store activity". But any agency which references its own name as frequently as the name of the product it promotes surely lives in just such a bubble.
Muckspreader Founding Partner, <name> said: ‘SILAGE has a history of bold & iconoclastic marketing, and we're looking forward to taking the brand to the next level. Muckspreader is an agency that loves to break convention, so we're delighted to be working with a brand of the same ambition in a category stuffed full of convention."
Taking the brand to the next level? Sheesh, has this agency no creative originality? The fascinating thing about what Aaron's boss has written is that his words could apply to almost any product - be that a restaurant, a fridge freezer or caravan holiday. In this case, obviously, it's custard.
SILAGE Marketing Controller <name> said: “Muckspreader have given us STENCH™ and we love it. The campaign is a perfect blend of our modern heritage and a simple truth - delivered in our inimitable <foreign> ‘truthful’ voice. We think those working in the Creative Industries are now looking for more depth and truth in their custard than that provided by the likes of <Competitor> with their annual limited edition packs. We look forward in the coming years, with Muckspreader’s help, to telling it as it is with STENCH™”
More vacuous brandspeak there, from a Marketing Controller seemingly more excited by the campaign than by the product itself. I'm especially intrigued by the concept of "modern heritage", as well as the suggestion that custard somehow blends "depth and "truth".
If you need to ask us anything at all then please do not hesitate to get in touch. Thanks, Aaron
So, if you're out on the swankier side of London in the near future, Aaron would like you to open your wallet to Silage. It's not the custard you'd usually choose, it's rather pricey, but this brand is wholly different because it's packed with pure Stench. Remember too, with every purchase, that some of your money is helping to keep Aaron and everyone at his PR agency in gainful employment. And, alas, expect far more Silage from Muckspreader in the future.
