Advertising, ad campaigns, ad agencies, and the people that make it happen

In the middle of all the commotion about the new role of the advertising agency and how it will have to adapt to the changing market/media/client landscape, I had to laugh when I read today that Campbell Soup is reprising its classic "Wow, I could've had a V8!" tagline—used 25 years ago—in a new campaign that seeks to draw in occasional users of the brand. The first of TV ads, from Y&R, New York, broke Monday and shows a couple winding up their dinner at a restaurant when the waiter returns to pick up the plates. The man returns his plate with a guilty look because it contains the uneaten vegetables. The tag is tweaked by a "Bop!" which is actually a sound effect made when the waiter taps the man on the head, prompting the man to exclaim, "I could've had a V8!" That’s funny, I don’t remember people in the original ads being hit on the head by waiters… But maybe that’s the Y&R contribution that they’ll charge the client an arm and a leg for. I mean otherwise, why don’t they just run the old spots? Come to think of it, you could say the same about Alka-Seltzer, Avis, Volkswagen, Hertz and a lot of other brands when you look at the junk they’re getting from their agencies currently.

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