POM Not So Wonderful
I love it when small companies take on the big boys. I especially love it when their product is superior to the big boys and customers recognize that. POM Wonderful is a good example. Their first big ad campaign included excellent outdoor/print executions with headlines like “Cheat Death” and “Life Support” - it was simple, clean and single-minded - and all created in-house!
On a recent trip to San Francisco, I noticed POM’s more recent campaign was everywhere. It still plays off the idea that the brand is “the anti-oxidant super-power” but executionally it has lost everything the first campaign had. The new stuff is badly written, messily laid out and has completely left the engaging wit of the previous campaign behind.
From the brilliant “Cheat Death” to “I’m off to Save Prostates” - what a disappointment! I just hope they didn’t move the work from in-house to an agency. When they were scrappy and hungry, they did much better work.
March 18th, 2009 at 10:40 am
The first set of ads are so visually impactful - it seems like the second set could have taken even more cues from Roy Lichtenstein and the like… it’s almost there, but not quite!
March 18th, 2009 at 12:50 pm
The new campaign looks to have been executed by clueless designers. What was the Creative thinking? It was done in house I believe, but the brand would probably benefit at this point to go external than stay with the in house team. Very sad.
March 18th, 2009 at 4:08 pm
Hey Megan - I get the comic book reference and yes, they could have pushed it into the realm of Pop Art from an art direction standpoint. I think my bigger beef was that the copy was so lacking in subtlety. It was as if they had taken a bunch of support points from the creative brief and then used them as headlines.
March 19th, 2009 at 8:57 am
Ugh. Another semi-forgettable campaign. I was trained to evaluate campaigns on their ability to create thought, challenge and provoke. Otherwise spend your mktg$ on coupons.
This new campaign falls into the “fortified water” category. The previous POM campaign fell into the “get off your butt and take control of your life” category.
March 24th, 2009 at 3:25 pm
I’m sorry, but the copy just reminds me of the satirical superhero character Greenzo from 30 Rock. “I’m off to save prostates” sounds like a kitschy joke vs. a genuine drive (to quote Eric) “to get off your butt.”
May 18th, 2009 at 2:59 pm
You can thank Liz Leow for all the wonderfully horrible creative directing, and Lynda Resnick for rubbing her “marketing expertise” all over the work, especially with the comic campaign.
And btw, for a company that claims to be “branding, media, strategy” specialists, the Egg Strategy team or the Dozen or whatever lame name have you, including all the folks — employees? — who leave “brilliant” comments haven’t said a single thing that a person off the street couldn’t say.
Bravo.