Is Iggy fit 4 life (insurance)?

By Paul Flower on Jan 21, 09 01:11 PM

Advertising works. Having worked at the edges of the industry, both buying and selling ads, for many years I guess I have to believe this. I also have plenty of related experiences and even personal anecdotal evidence.

For instance my daughter recently showed me the compare the meerkat website. She's 12 and has no interest in buying insurance so you might imagine that the point of the ads is lost, but it's made an impression and the brand is now fixed in her head. There are countless other ad-jingles that she can sing with very little influence from me, usually I'm begging her to stop.

I often think I'm hardened against sales messages but even I became tempted by a press ad last week offering a free pint with a lunchtime meal at certain Irish theme pubs. I was tempted even though the pint was of 'trendy fake Irish cider' and I'm less likely to drink this (in a glass with ice) than I am to do a naked morris dance in the middle of Broad Street. Neither of these things is going to happen btw.

Sadly I find that due to my personal involvement and probable over-exposure most ads either fail to influence me or actually drive me totally nuts. There are two current TV ads for insurance which do a bit of both. I have no idea why Iggy Pop appears in the Swift Cover ads other than to destroy my love and respect for the man I consider to be the original punk and one of the greatest rock n' roll performers in history. It's not an ad about the company changing its name, why is he there? I confess that although I've probably seen the ad a dozen or so times but I get so angry that I completely miss the voiceover.

Are Swiftcover offering insurance for stage-divers or self-harmers or for those who over-indulge in drugs? Do they know anything of Iggy's history? If celebs in ads are meant to influence us - because of our affinity with the celeb - then this one fails massively. The only people who recognise Iggy will be people who love him. Those people (like me) will be offended by his presence in an insurance ad and choose any other company rather than Swift. Those who don't recognise him will see some wiry, muscular 62 yr old selling insurance and wonder why. Why, Iggy, WHY???

The other insurance ad finds Norwich Union changing its name to Aviva and features celebs that, like Iggy and Norwich Union, have changed their name. All well and good I guess, except that Aviva is a stupid, meaningless name unlike Norwich Union which speaks of some heritage and respectability. You will have had an association with Norwich Union, your parents may have chosen them above others - Aviva frankly could be anything or anyone. You could also argue that insurance company names don't matter as we all use screen-scrapers like compare the meerkat to find our insurance these days.

The other problem is, of course, the celebs. They all speak of their doubts over whether their original, parent-given name would've allowed them to enjoy the same successes as their assumed name. Fair enough for some of them like Iggy's Detroit dwelling pal Alice Cooper, born as Vincent Furnier; the others are more spurious. The one that really sticks out like the proverbial sore thumb is Richard Starkey, better known as Ringo Starr.

We're asked to consider whether Ringo would've had fans flocking to him had he kept his original name. The answer is inevitably, yes. He was the f*cking drummer in the Beatles, all the rest of the band had ordinary names - one was called George for f*cks sake. The band were brilliant and huge, consequently it wouldn't have mattered if he'd been called Bertie Bollockscratcher, he was the f*cking drummer.

We're also reminded by his reappearance on our TV screens of the last time we saw him - not surrounded by black & white images of limo-chasing fans. No, our last memory of Richard is of him telling fans not to bother sending him stuff to sign, that they should just feck off and not trouble him as he's too busy. Too busy doing what exactly? Counting the hairs in his beard, or cashing in his cheques from stupidly-named insurance companies?

The other ad that troubles me of late is one which may require a further blog at another time. It's the nanny-state telling us how fat we're getting or actually how fat our children are getting. I suspect we may have noticed our fatness, or that of those around us thanks to the programmes that fill the space around these ads - my 50 ton son or whatever. The ads themselves are very watchable, Keith Haring meets Aardman Animations - I hope that both are earning a royalty. The point here is whether they'll actually do any good.

The Govt. want to re-educate us, OK so job partly done - we all sit around too much instead of having to go and kill our own dinosaur burgers. I have a slight historical problem with that but we'll gloss over it and instead wonder why it is that I can't remember the name of the campaign.

I know it has a number in place of a word and that it's something 4 life but 4 the life of me I can't ever remember it. In my mind it's Fit4life but in searching for it I find that it's actually Change4Life. To me, this says that it's a bad name. I've seen it a lot and can't remember the campaign name. Also at the end of the ad it tells you to search for the name rather than giving the url. The point of the ad is to tell us that we're all too f*cking lazy, you expect us to get off our fat arses and search?

The Govt, Iggy & Ringo can all just feck off.

I will return to this next time, I have plenty more to say.

In the meantime remember Ron, & Iggy when he was the man: