I’m not a TV watcher. Not having a television will do that. The old habit is gone. When I check in to a hotel, it doesn’t even occur to me to turn on the flatscreen. Thus, I’m not up to date on all the latest TV commercials. Does that insurance company still use the gecko mascot? What’s the latest McDonald’s jingle? What is the most commonly advertised prescription drug in the U.S. and which side effects sound the worst?
These are not burning questions.
Nowadays, my ads are limited to the annoying interruptions on YouTube. I abhor the bank ads. I quickly close the informercial that villainizes bananas. And I will never ever have anything to do with Grammarly due to their overly long ads. (What could they possibly teach me about editing?)
It would be odd to say I miss commercials. Still, I can look back and recall some memorable ones. As a kid, I liked the seasonal Coke commercials that included the song “I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing.” The animated Tang commercials with Martians spark nostalgia. As well, the Wendy’s “Where’s the Beef” commercials with Clara Peller were amusing.
Some commercials caught my eye because of the guy featured in them. A dozen years ago, I blogged about how I crushed on David Naughton when he was the dancing-singing spokesperson in Dr. Pepper’s “Be a Pepper” ads. More than that, I ogled Lucky Vanous in the Diet Coke commercials at least as much as the women who objectified him.
In the late ’80s/early ’90s, another series of commercials proved ogle-worthy due to the models in them. The ads for C & R Clothiers, primarily a men’s suit chain, were must-see worthy. Typically, they featured impossibly hot men, the kind with chiseled faces and bodies that were GQ cover-worthy (before the magazine went with celebrities). As the song “What a Difference a Day Makes” played, a model would be featured first in a work uniform or casual attire looking sumptuous enough. Then, he’d don a suit, supposedly looking hotter as a well-dressed man.
The ads may have been thirst traps but they didn’t seem to help C & R’s business which went into bankruptcy, then folded as some stores were taken over by Men’s Wearhouse. How could the ads have not led men to go into a suit-buying frenzy? How could C & R have not overtaken Brooks Brothers?
I would posit that C & R had the wrong target audience. Sure, gay men like me took notice when the commercial aired but the ad would have otherwise appealed to women. A hot man like Lucky Vanous might boost diet soda sales as women are more prone (and pressured) to try diet products, but the homoerotic suit dudes may have, in fact, turned men away from C & R. I suspect that another problem was that the models looked equally hot in the “before” (non-suited) image. Hot “before,” then hot “after” shots just meant the featured dude was a hot guy. A guy watching at home in an undershirt, boxers and flip flops would have enough sense to know that wearing a suit would have inherent limitations in improving his appearance. While ZZ Top might be right that “every girl’s crazy ’bout a sharp dressed man,” a C & R suit would have no greater impact than a suit from any other men’s store.
Alas, the ads are long gone, along with the company. How nice that I can still find them on YouTube… after I close that dang Grammarly ad.
