Monthly Archives: January 2024

Can Philip Morris International Zynoculate Itself With a New Ad Campaign?

by doctorads

Well the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads,

There I was, minding my own business and plowing through the Sunday New York Times, when I came across this full-page ad from Philip Morris International about its Zyn nicotine pouches, which are apparently quite popular among the younger set.

Think the tobacco industry’s latest damage-control campaign can work, Doc?

– Zynterested Observer

Dear ZO,

Zynteresting indeed.

That ad comes in the wake of  this piece by Emily Dreyfuss in the Times Opinion section two weeks ago, which detailed the growing flight from vaping to nicotine pouches among teenagers and young adults.

Do you know what a Zynbabwe is? Or an upper-decky lip pillow? OK, here’s an easier one — how about just Zyn?

If you are scratching your head, don’t feel bad: Almost no adult I have spoken to has had any idea either. This is despite the fact that the nicotine pouch Zyn is a jewel in the crown of a multibillion-dollar tobacco company. Haven’t heard of nicotine pouches to begin with? Neither had I. But when I ask my 19-year-old neighbor Ian if he knows what a Zynbabwe is, I get a shocked reply: “You know about Zyns?”

Young people certainly do, Dreyfuss says, thanks in no small part to the tobacco giant’s efforts. “P.M.I. is . . . a company that has long denied it markets tobacco products to minors despite decades of research accusing it of just that. One 2022 study alone found its brands advertising near schools and playgrounds around the globe.”

Thus the full-page ads spinning out corporate eyewash such as “We restrict the marketing and sale of  ZYN to those of legal age – which is 21 in the U.S. We do not use social media influencers in the U.S.”

That, of course, is meaningless, since social media influencers in the U.S. use Zyn – prodigiously – as Sasha Rogelberg has detailed in Fortune.

Nicotine pouches, which do not contain tobacco but are slipped under a user’s lip like snus, have grown wildly popular. Over 800 million units were sold between January and March 2022, compared to 126.06 million units between August to December 2019 and beating out its competitors. ZYN shipped 105.4 million cans in the U.S. in their 2023 Q3, a 65.7% increase from Swedish Match’s 63.6 million can shipments in the same period in 2022. Philip Morris International, which owns ZYN’s parent company Swedish Match, partially attributed their $9 billion in quarterly net revenue to the “exceptional growth” of ZYN.

On social media, young people and so-called “Zynfluencers” are spreading the nicotine buzz, withTikToks using #zyn receiving over 715.6 million views to date.

Something similar happened several years ago with Juul Labs Inc., which in 2019 owned 75% of the e-cigarette market and was valued at over $38 billion, Suddenly the Food and Drug Administration was on Juul Labs like Brown on Williamson, and there were over 5000 lawsuits accusing the company of deceptive marketing and targeting of minors.  That led to a flurry of newspaper ads like this one.

The campaign worked so well, Juul has shelled out over $3 billion in legal settlements since then, and the company’s products are still in regulatory limbo.

So the Doc’s prescription for P.M.I.:  Zynvest in some malpractice insurance. Zynstantly.

Apple Ripped Off Masimo’s Technology, So Masimo Ripped Off Apple’s TV Spot?

by doctorads

Well the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads, 

There I was, minding my own business and paging through the Boston Globe, when I came across this full-page ad for the medical technology company Masimo, which is pursuing  a patent dispute with Apple over something something something about Apple watches.

“Here’s to the underdogs . . . “?  Why does that sound so familiar, Doc?

–  Apple Chord

Dear AC,

For starters, here’s how the Masimo ad (which also ran in the Wall Street Journal yesterday) begins.

Loose translation: Masimo is David, having developed medical monitoring technology that it alleges Apple – which would be the bully – stole for its Apple Watch, as Aaron Tilley has detailed in the Wall Street Journal.

Ad transition: The copy sounds familiar because it echoes a legendary 1997 Apple TV spot that would “eventually play a pivotal role in helping Apple achieve one of the greatest corporate turnarounds in business history,” according to adman Rob Siltanen’s inside account for Forbes.

The commercial was Here’s to the Crazy Ones, and these were its opening lines.

Here’s to the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes… the ones who see things differently — they’re not fond of rules…

Here’s the spot, whose script Steve Jobs initially derided as “sh-t.”

And, for those of you keeping score at home,  here’s Masimo’s closing stock price yesterday after dropping six figures on full-page newspaper ads.

The Doc’s diagnosis: Actual underdog to be determined at a later (court) date.

Wait – Could Dr. Ads Actually Be Sued For Marketing Malpractice?

by doctorads

Well the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads,

There I was, minding my own business and starting to read the Wall Street Journal, when I came across Erin Mulvaney’s Page One piece about the barrage of ad campaigns seeking plaintiffs for megabucks product-liability and personal-injury cases.

Nearly 800,000 television advertisements for mass litigation ran in 2023 at a cost of more than $160 million, according to X Ante, a firm that specializes in research on mass tort advertising. Ad spending has been at historic highs in recent years, showing surges when particular cases gain steam. When lawsuits targeting Monsanto’s Roundup weedkiller were gaining momentum in the courts in 2019, for example, overall industry ad spending reached nearly $300 million on television spots.

It’s even crazier than that, as you can see in this Journal chart of the top five tort targets for the past ten years.

(Glyphosate = Roundup weedkiller, for those of you keeping score at home.)

Hey, Doc – any litigation consternation about the prolific advice you dish to the ad-lorn?

– Sweet Sue

Dear SS,

For starters, please see the federally mandated warning in the banner atop this post.

Dr. Ads Is Not a Licensed Physician

So it’s not the Doc who needs malpractice insurance; it’s all the consumer brands out there scamming the fine folks across this great land of ours.

Like who? Like the fruit-faking, truth- and union-busting executives at Starbucks, whose grift NPR’s Joe Hernandez has detailed.

Mango Dragonfruit Starbucks Refreshers are missing mango, Strawberry Açaí Starbucks Refreshers lack açaí and Pineapple Passionfruit Starbucks Refreshers have no passion fruit.

That’s what two consumers who have sued Starbucks for consumer protection law violations say about the coffee giant’s fruit-based drinks. [In September] a federal judge in Manhattan ruled their case could move forward.

Then you’ve got the Great Reese’s Halloween Face-Plant, as USA Today’s Sarah Al-Arshani reported.

A Florida woman upset that Reese’s holiday-themed chocolates did not feature the same cute designs she claims was shown on its packaging is suing manufacturer Hershey’s for false advertisement.

In a lawsuit filed on Dec. 28 in Florida’s Middle District Court, Cynthia Kelly sued Hershey’s for $5 million, alleging that the company misled buyers with “false and deceptive advertising” on their packaging.”This is a class action against Hershey for falsely representing several Reese’s Peanut Butter products as containing explicitly carved-out artistic designs when there are no such carvings in the actual products,” the lawsuit said.

Not so sweet, eh Sue? The same law firm is suing Burger King for misrepresenting food items as larger than they actually are.

According to this Forbes piece by Dr. Marcus Collins, the issue goes beyond any technical definition of false advertising.

This story is about shared understanding and its impact on expectations and trust. If Reese’s understood that some people would see the packaging and expect the product to look exactly as it does on the wrapper then the company would have likely engraved the smile on the candy or put a disclaimer on the packaging. But it didn’t. Reese’s didn’t have that understanding, which led to unmet expectations and broken trust due to consumer disappointment.

Of course, no one in their right mind has any expectations or illusions about what the Doc might say. So no broken trust, right?

Case closed.

Shouldn’t Joe Biden’s Campaign Just Set His Advertising Dollars on Fire?

by doctorads

Well the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads,

There I was, minding my own business and checking out Politico Playbook, when I came across this item about Joe Biden’s campaign jumping on “[a] recent Suffolk University/USA Today poll [which] found that 59% of voters agreed that prosecuting the [January 6] rioters was ‘the appropriate work of the justice system.’” 

These public perceptions, of course, create a major opening for Biden. And, as we’ve written several times now in Playbook, the president continues to lean in. During his speech yesterday at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, Biden cast his own reelection — and Trump’s defeat —as imperative to protecting democracy.

“Whether democracy is still America’s sacred cause is the most urgent question of our time. It is what the 2024 election is all about,” Biden said, a message that’s front and center in a new campaign ad that will start airing today in seven swing states.

Is pearl-clutching about threats to democracy really a threat to Donald Trump’s 2024 prospects, Doc? Or is Scranton Joe just whistling past the graveyard?

– Biden My Time

Dear BMT,

First of all, don’t say “graveyard” in the same sentence as Joe Biden. Beyond that, the Doc has previously noted that there are serious questions about the efficacy of presidential TV advertising (even if they’re raised by GOP chew toy Vivek Ramaswamy).

Regardless, Biden has so far failed to develop an effective advertising message. As New York Times reporter Reed Epstein detailed on The Daily podcast, his campaign recently spent $40 million on swing-state ads promoting Biden’s economic record – to little or no avail.

Epstein also pointed out that another potential ad theme – Trump’s 91 felony charges – is largely off limits. Biden can’t/won’t talk about the four separate Trump indictments because that just plays into Trump’s claim that the Department of Justice is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Biden Crime Family.

So what’s a fella to do? This, apparently.

Those people are nuts graf: “I’ve made the preservation of American democracy an essential issue of my presidency. Now, something dangerous is happening in America. There’s an extremist movement that does not share the basic beliefs in our democracy.”

The ad, which is paid for by the Democratic National Committee, is not getting a lot of love on YouTube: 97,000 views but only 2700 thumbs up. Not to mention lots of comments like these.

As Epstein noted on The Daily, voters concerned about threats to democracy are likely already in the anti-Trump camp, so Biden might just be whistling past the . . . voting booth with that approach.

The Doc is not in the habit of prescribing remedies for ailing political campaigns. But in this case, Joe Biden might want to forget surrogates like the oily Gavin Newsom and get himself a witch doctor to generate some good juju.

Just sayin’.

Could a TV Spot From U.S. Families of Hamas Hostages Actually Work?

by doctorads

Well the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads,

There I was, minding my own business and scrolling through Politico Playbook, when I came across this item about a new effort to free the eight American hostages held by Hamas since October 7.

FIRST IN PLAYBOOK — A new national TV ad from the families of U.S. citizens still held hostage by Hamas calls on U.S. officials to do more to help bring them home alive, and soon. “Act now, or more will die,” a narrator says. “Every second counts.” The eight Americans have spent nearly three months in captivity, and the spot highlights the brutality of the Oct. 7 attack. Targeting elite audiences, the six-figure ad buy from the Hostages and Missing Families Forum will run for a week.

Think that might make a difference, Doc?

– Fingers Crossed

Dear FC,

Given that the Hamas hostage standoff includes more moving parts than an hourglass, it’s tough to gauge what impact – if any – this ad from the Hostages and Missing Families Forum might have.

Start with the six-figure ad buy, which could be anywhere from $100,000 to $999,999. Assuming the ad budget is at the lower end of that range, the group might be hoping to create a news ad – “an ad that is designed to give news coverage,” as media theorist Kathleen Hall Jamieson has defined it.

So far, the ad hasn’t gained much traction, at least according to Google News. That might change, though, now that the New York Times website has posted this Michael D. Shear piece.

The families of Americans held hostage in Gaza since the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks in southern Israel have released a television ad to press for urgent action to rescue their loved ones.

The 30-second spot, which is set to air on cable networks and during Sunday network news programs in the United States for the next several weeks, shows grainy images of the hostages being seized by Hamas militants, and black-and-white images of the captive Americans.

Given that the Times is still the assignment desk for much of the news media, that could jumpstart more coverage, especially tomorrow when the story will likely run in the paper’s print edition. Maybe by then the Hostages and Missing Families Forum will have also produced a press release about the ad, which it has inexplicably failed to do so far.

There’s also social media to give the group’s plea a boost. Although the ad’s YouTube video  has garnered only 1400  views in its first 24 hours online, #BringThemHomeNow has lots of activity on Xitter, and the Bring Them Home Now Facebook page has 52,000 likes and 71,000 followers.

In the end, who knows whether the “elite audiences” the group is targeting will get the message. Regardless, the Doc’s fingers are crossed as well.