This week, a brand cooks up controversy, with some raw unoriginality. Your favourite emoji are not cool any more. A class A rebrand for a class C product. And a brand pays athletes to get the conversation – about periods – flowing.
Cooking up controversy
Who’s hungry for a Marc Jacob’s Tote Bag? Internet sensation and sometime troll Nara Smith has gone viral, again, with another one of her from-scratch recipes. She rolls out some cherry red dough, pops it in the oven and takes out a perfectly baked Marc Jacobs tote bag.
It’s gorgeous and clever. The only problem? A short time after it was posted a small creator called Mary Korlin Downs pointed out that a month earlier she had made almost the exact same video. Which, in turn, sparked a torrent of racist, hateful abuse against Nara. Because of course it did.
It’s a toxic mess, and rational observers point out that there’s a lot of blame to go around. The original video was made with a bag sent to Mary Korlin Downs by Marc Jacobs themselves, so they were obviously aware of the content. And Nara’s video seems to have been made by Marc Jacobs, and never appeared on her feed, only on Marc Jacobs.
As marketers, of course we want to get the best content onto the biggest channels, but for f***’s sake people, treat the creators with some respect.
Your emoji game is passé
To coincide with World Emoji Day which took place last week, the emoji report (by design service Superside) has revealed the fourteen emojis that we are falling out of love with. And yes, it’s the ones you use the most. The ‘okay hand’ 👌 has lost the most street-cred, with ‘flushed face’ 😳 and ‘person raising both hands in celebration’ 🙌 following closely behind.
In Europe, the ‘face screaming in fear’ 😱 , ‘smirking face’ 😏 and ‘peace sign’ ✌️are officially ‘démodé’.
92% of the online population use emojis daily. If you want to be one of the cool ones, then maybe check out the full report here.
Smoking hot pot brand
Image: weed.de
Earlier this year, Germany partially decriminalised weed possession. Woohoo. However, despite the lack of restriction, there’s still a lot of negative preconceptions around the devil’s lettuce, or should we say Der Teufelssalat.
Enter London-based creative agency, That Thing.
That Thing took on the challenge of rebranding weed.de, the national information site, taking on the stigma and myths around cannabis, and redefining the category via the medium of strategic + thought-provoking creativity. Man.
With the drug available in selected pharmacies, they positioned the site as a ‘guide’, with the tagline ‘Find Your Way’, and bold and clever branding built around a logo reminiscent of a compass, but that spells out ‘weed’.
“The herb” is still classed as a drug (the same class as paracetamol) which means the designers faced constraints, such that the drug (or plant) cannot be shown on the packaging. Obviously, like ourselves, the guys in That Thing love a loophole, so they used 3D and motion to create a series of “hyperreal buds”, loosely based on the three varieties.
Class.
Cash in on cramps
Image: knix
All roads currently lead to the Paris Olympics and period intimates brand Knix has decided to try to mooch off some of that spotlight. As part of their latest campaign, “Sport Your Period”, and with the help of former Olympian, Megan Rapinoe, the brand is offering athletes up to $2,000 to talk about their periods.
It’s about time we cash in on all those cramps, right?
Periods in sports have been a taboo subject forever. Even though we know there’s nothing to be ashamed of it’s not easy to dispel long held beliefs. Knix is campaigning to get the conversation flowing – pun absolutely intended.
Ultimately, the campaign is not just about talking; it’s about breaking down barriers that hold athletes back . Half of female teen athletes skip games because of their period, which is perhaps not surprising given the discomfort, pain, embarrassment, worry, and general sense of crappiness that often comes along with it.
By normalising the conversation around menstruation, Knix hopes to keep more athletes in the game, one paid period mention at a time.