ICM - Leeds Design Agency

Clever advertising requires a savvy and creative team, but a series of ads for Play-Doh in a magazine from Singapore took it a little too far. Inventive? Or just creepy?

These advertisements were only printed a single time, as upon the discovery by parent company Hasbro that somebody in their Singapore office had approved the ads, they promptly pulled the ads.

These images apparently try to remind people that Play-Doh is extremely safe for children to play with, but we’d be far more concerned if your kid was fashioning switchblades of clay than if they accidentally ingested a bit of Play-D…

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No longer will you have to stick up with parties where you have to use this General Knowledge and Intelligence stuff!!. Now you can use your knowledge of marketing, branding and everyday advertising. Geography? Popular Music? Science??!!?? I don’t think so . . . Wow your guests with the quickfire answers to partially obscured icons and images. Dazzle your neighbours with your Google-esqe prowess of breakfast cereal character names.

Awesome . . .

On the flipside – what does this say about the state of board games today? Have they run out of ideas? There are plenty of film franchise and TV show tie-in games around (I am pretty sure I have seen a High School Musical game kicking around my daughters bedroom!). They have become the norm as part of the larger moneymaking machine around productions like that.

But what target market is THIS game aiming for? Surely not JUST designers and marketeers? Or has the society as a while become SO used to brands, image, marketing and in particular logos, that we absorb it as part of daily life – Like background noise, does a logo have the same effect even if it is in your peripheral vision? Have we become SO used to branding that products and services are seen as having a lesser value if they have little or no branding?

What do you think? Are you a Logo Geek? Can you tell the difference between flavors of Walkers crisps just by the colour of pack…

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WOAH!!!!!

A story that has appeared – that at first seemed like a hoax – turns out to be true!! Kellogg’s are testing LASER ENGRAVING ON THEIR PRODUCTS!!!!! For those of you that want to know the whole story – other than the fact that – DUDE!!!!! LASER ENGRAVED CORNFLAKES!!!!! WOAH!!!!!

Then here are the links:

From the Daily Mail

From Kelloggs’ website

The idea being that Kellogg’s (The Original and Best) want to give the cheaper brands something to think about – BY SHOOTING A LASER AT THE FLAKES AND BURNING THE LOGO ON IT – THE AWESOMENESS IS BLINDING ME!!!!!!!!

The process may be in its early stages of testing, but the idea is fantastic (if a little strange at the same time). The laser burns just enough of the surface to engrave the logo – without changing the taste of the flake.

So where will this end? Probably here, on the internet. Until the cost of the technology comes down to millionths of pence per flake – I am sure that Kellogg’s will not be branding their flakes . . . but geeks like me will be crossing our fingers that it WILL happen . . . Pew Pew P…

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