It was one of the Queen's 80th birthday's last week so The Times did a reproduction of the paper from the day she was born. Not much has changed. Political coverage is largely identical to today and so are the ads. Or at least the strategies. I thought this was interesting. We puff on about innovative strategic hoo-hah but most of what we do is identical to strategies in use 80 years ago, or probably since the dawn of time/commerce.
Very little's changed here. You see ads like this all the time.
I like the fact that one of the reasons cited for buying a British car is that they're uniquely suited to British driving conditions. (Steering wheel placement is important for a start.)
You probably couldn't get away with saying 'medium-powered car' these days. You'd have to say something like venti-powered. Or high power to weight ratio. Or GTI.
Proper snob appeal. But for salt?
One thing I love is the modesty and reasonableness of the claims. 'Fashionable hats at moderate prices'. Who wouldn't want that. None of the modern hype that enables Chrylser to say something like it's not just a car, it's a Chrysler. (Or something, I saw a poster, I don't really remember it.)
Thanks for a very good blog.
Just a small note on your note on salt advertising. In Sweden, a proper snob appeal is actually a correct strategy at the moment. Don't know if Maldon salt is very expensive in UK, but in Sweden a pack is about 3£ and standard salt is 50 pence. And there a numbers of even more expensive salts on the market. This salt mania started by a TV-chef (the Swedish Jamie Oliver, but a bit more downmarket) called Tina the chef. When she introduced sea salt to the Swedes a couple of years ago, it was impossible for months to buy upmarket salt because of the high demand.
Posted by: Elias Betinakis | April 24, 2006 at 12:51 PM
This is really interesting. I've often thought that advertising hasn't come very far when I look at old newspapers and film footage. It still seems to be shouting to thousands of people who couldn't care less. Imagine how far communications have come or food preparation. Then again I had the same thought about cars - gears, cogs, and a chimney (exhaust); they just seem so 19th century.
Posted by: Pete | April 25, 2006 at 09:57 AM