Download 1950s/60sAdvertising: Creative Revolution

1950sAdvertising;
1960s and Creative Revolution
MIT3214
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Interwar Advertising
1.
2.
Social Change: urbanization/immigration
Social Adaptation
1.
2.
3.
4.
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emotional/personal insecurities
Listerine/’halitosis’
apostles of modernity/zerrespiegel
conformity/emerging ‘mass society’
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Mass Society Critique
1.
Middletown
1.
2.
2.
3.
Robert/Helen Lynd (1929)
Malaise of
mass/commercial culture
Stuart Chase, Sinclair
Lewis, J. Kerouac
Bohemia
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Mass Society Critique (post-WII)
1.
David Riesman
1.
2.
2.
The Lonely Crowd (1950)
Inner-directed/outer-directed
William H. Whyte
1.
2.
3.
4.
The Organization Man (1956)
Malaise of bureaucracy/
collectivism
loss of individualism
‘group-mindedness’
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Mass Culture Critique/Culture
Industry

Frankfurt School
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T. Adorno/G. Marcuse
Culture Industries serve
Corporate Capitalism
Network radio/TV; ‘top
40’ pop music; tabloids,
Hollywood
Ideological reproduction
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1950s Advertising
1.
2.
Television
Research/Social Science
1.
3.
Simple Message;
Repetition
1.
4.
quantify ad effectiveness
Slogans, jingles
Doctor/Scientist
testimonial
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Rosser Reeves
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Methodist upbringing
Ted Bates Agency
Low esteem of public
Repetition: single
selling message
Large media buys
Political advertising,
1952
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Unique Selling Proposition
(USP)
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Colgate: “Cleans Your
Breath While it Cleans
Your Teeth”
M&Ms (“Melts in Your
Mouth, Not in Your
Hand” )
simple ad + repetition
over ad variation
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Anacin
1.
2.
3.
4.
Radio/TV
$18m to $54m in 18
months (mid-1950s)
Repetition/Incantation
“Power of Threes”
1.
5.
fast, Fast, FAST Relief
http://ca.youtube.com
/watch?v=oeas5jtffpM
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1950s Ads

William Whyte &
Bad advertising:
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“groupthink”
mass Audience
“group harmony” of
ad agencies
Thomas Frank
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Mad Men



Transitional/Liminal
Era (1960-63)
Historical Foresight
Surface Pleasures
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Don Draper/Mad Men



Depth/Identity
Authenticity/
Artifice
Kodak/Carousel

http://www.youtub
e.com/watch?v=su
RDUFpsHus&featur
e=related
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Mad Men

Draper as Metaphor
for Advertising?
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Did Mainstream Co-opt
Counter-Culture of 1960s?
Conventional View:
1.
Business culture:
1.
2.
Counter-culture:
1.
2.
3.
monolithic, hierarchical, homogenous
Dionysian, vibrant, spontaneous
Subversive
Counter culture becomes mass movement
1.
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business co-opts; harness for own ends
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T. Frank

Capitalism’s own
insurgency



Pre-date Counterculture
Common goals with
counter culture
Advertising’s “Creative
Revolution”
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Managerial Revolt
Douglas McGregor
 Human Side of Enterprise
 Theory “X”/“Y” Firms
 Theory X



Hierarchy, organization,
strict supervision
Stifle creativity, innovation
Less competitive
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McGregor…

Theory Y Firm:
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

Flatter organization;
non-hierarchical
Promote creativity;
spontaneity
More profitable
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Late 1950s/early 1960s
Business Culture



Not all “flat gray,”
conservative, “square”
Not juxtaposed to
Counter Culture
Business & “antiestablishment”
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Creative Revolution
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Creative over
Research/Account Execs
No ‘rule-book’ ad writing
“boutique” agencies
Theory Y workplace
Early 1960s to mid1970s
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C.R. Themes
1.
2.
Humour/Irony
Rebel Talk;
1.
2.
3.
Individualism;
anti-consumerism to
sell goods
Youth Talk
1.
2.
Youth as attitude,
break w/ conformity
new and exciting
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Bill Bernbach
1.
2.
3.
Grey Advertising
1945-49
Doyle Dane
Bernbach, 1949
Jewish clients
1.
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Anti-Semitism
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Bernbach/Volkswagen Beetle
1.
2.
3.
4.
Ignite Creative
Revolution
1938 -Germany –
”People’s Car”
modest post-war
sales
Jewish Agency/Nazi
Car
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VW Ads


“Lemon”
“Think Small”
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VW Ads


“How Much Longer
Can We Hand You
This Line”
“Is Volkswagen
contemplating a
change?”
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VW


simple photographs, minimal layout,
large, clever headlines
Hip Consumerism: Savvy to car-buying
manipulation

register disgust/skepticism =buy a Beetle
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Hip Consumerism ads




speak flippantly of
product
mock consumer
culture/critique mass
society
Escape, rebellion,
nonconformity
counterculture imagery
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Hip Consumerism
1.
2.
Fuel consumerism with
discontent of
consumerism
Reification
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Hip Consumerism
1.
Dynamism of Capitalism
1.
2.
3.
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Adaptive
neutralize genuine opposition
Pre-emptive Irony
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Cultural Logic of Hip
Consumerism
1.
2.
3.
Cultural elites/
Positional goods
Rebelling and
status competition
Negative-sum
game
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Cultural logic..

Stolichnaya Vodka

Other Examples?
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What to do?



Avoid positional goods
grounded in comparisons?
Don’t express individuality
via consumption?
“Uniforms” to foster
genuine individualism?
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Exam Review:



Section One (3 X 5 points = 15 points)
 “Identify/discuss significance of three of following
for study of advertising.” Likely 3 of 5
Section Two (5 X 1 points = 5 points)
 Multiple Choice (a,b,c,d)
Section Three = 5 points
 Discuss significance of 1 of 2 ads shown
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Exam 





Includes material from readings
20% of final grade
Closed Book
75 minutes
Written in Classroom
A-L in NCB 117; M-Z in NCB 114
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Exam Review Sample Answer
“Reification”
 Reading: Leiss, Kline, Jhally, 29-30
 Marxist critique of advertising
C social environment where needs
(emotional, personal, familial, material)
met by purchase of consumer goods in
market
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Review…Reification
C
C
C
C
Ideology: A. cultural function not sell specific
products but inculcate belief that only consumption
provides contentment, happiness, self-fulfillment, etc.
consumer goods and advertisements stand in way of
people and their true needs.
goods never achieve resolution of profound personal
and social needs; create more unfulfilled wants.
relate to “hip consumerism,” how ‘dissent’ registered
through purchases, not social/political action
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