Black Princesses and Ad Gurus

Within the space of 10 minutes TV viewing last night (29.01.10) I was reminded of what I do for a living – is it increased awareness, or is it just a sign of the times?  The opening of “The Empire Strikes Back” at the Saatchi Gallery followed by a Walt Disney trailer for The Princess and the Frog.  In fact, one of my colleagues, who BTW is Asian, said that her daughter asked her “mummy, why is the Princess black?”

So ex advertising guru’s who know how to create hype and studios who have always relied heavily on the white Western dollar are succumbing to the pulling power of reaching out to our increasingly diverse community.  What are you doing to include this growing population?

KAREN NEEDHAM

So much for Assimilation

Last night’s episode of The Family disproved the widely held belief that 3^rd and 4^th generation Asians choose Western culture over their own.  Tindy (23), single, drives a BMW, chooses for his entertainment, a venue that played Asian music and encouraged traditional Asian mixed with contemporary Western dancing.  So much for Kiss FM et al.  If you missed the show…..here’s the link.

KAREN NEEDHAM

Hall of Shame

One of our key goals as a company, apart from getting rich, is to champion the cause of better marketing to ethnic minority consumers.  With that in mind I'm planning to put together a Hall of Shame to demonstrate when the so-called joined up thinking between strategy, planning, creative and buying doesn't ... 'join up' and the resulting ads.  Here's a taster: http://www.brandrepublic.com/Discipline/Digital/News/929847/Microsoft-caught-race-row-editing-black-man-photo/. In this ad, somebody at Microsoft had used old creative for a campaign in Poland and substituted the a black man with a white man.  This harks back to the famous Ford recruitment campaign in the early 90s when they changed the Asian workers in the ad to all white workers.

I'll post more examples soon.  Like the Subway ad placed in The Muslim Weekly News proudly announcing the launch of Subway's range of 100% Halal products, except the creative agency had used an image of a sub containing pepparami and ham.

JAY RAI

do names matter?

What's in a name?  Could Kamaljit Singh Jhooti have got to number one in the US?  No is the answer according to Jay Sean, the overnight RnB sensation who spent 7 years working on his 'overnight' success.  Names do still matter in the UK.  I'm all for people keeping 'true to their roots', but sometimes making it easier for the mass market open doors that would otherwise remained shut.   That's why Jatinder Pal Singh Rakraiya became Jay Rai.  

Diabetes and ethnicity

BBC One: Inside Out, 16 Nov 2009

Did you see this programme?  It was trying to raise awareness amongst all communities, of what’s known as a killer disease – Diabetes.  It reinforced the need to be tested and interviewed a cross-section of the public highlighting those most likely to contract this illness.  Yes, you guessed – black and Asian residents are 6 x’s more likely to contract Diabetes leading to CHD.  Now, all you planning & buying for low sugar, low fat products really should get in touch with us.  Take a look at the link……

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/search/?q=Inside%20Out%20London

KAREN NEEDHAM