Cause "Pick" of the Month

April Fools has come and past . . . but corporate tobacco is the biggest . . .

It's been a couple of years since the April Fools Day this spot first ran, but it marked the date of one of the most innovative and opportunistic social marketing ploys we've seen in a long time, on behalf of the American Legacy Foundation. It's our first full-motion video "Pick" incidentally, and we're excited about that, too!

A very serious exec stands in his plush coporate lobby and announces a recall of his principle product because it is affecting people's health.

Sound familiar? I confess, I wrote one of the first of its genre back in 1982 for the Tylenol recall following the tragic tampering incidents. The style, tone, and some of the words that this "TOBACCO INDUSTRY CHAIRMAN" speaks are all very familiar, much the same as those spoken by Tylenol's Dr. Gates almost 20 years ago, and more recently by Jaques Nasser, CEO of Ford after the SUV tire problem.

This "Chairman" ends his speech with the telling line: "if there are two things the tobacco indistry cares about, it's your health and your trust!"

Tylenol had earned your trust, Ford's trying hard to, but big tobacco deserves the "April Fools" title that follows this mock mea culpa.

It's been a long time since I've heard this kind of "buzz" about a spot. Everybody was talking about it the next day, and that's very rare for a public service spot. Bravo to the American Legacy Foundation, and the folks at Arnold Worldwide who created it!

Irony rules!

April Fools Spot (Streamed audio/video)

Michael Moore takes on Second Hand Smoke for an unfortunately brief run.

And speaking of irony, one of the masters of ironic documentary film making recently brought his brilliant crew to Boston to interview some surprised Toxic Waste experts about the chemicals in second hand smoke.

The resulting 30 second films by the Director of "Roger and Me", "The Big One," and the TV Series "TV Nation," were quite wonderful, and started running in Massachusetts in May.

Sadly, due to the current biochemical threat, they were retired and will probably not be revived.

Previous Cause "Pick" of the Month

Michael J. Fox Foundation breaks the "rules" yet comes up with a winner!

When I wrote "The Art of Cause Marketing" I tried very hard to keep it from becoming a list of "rules" that should be followd when preparing a cause ad.

David Ogilvy, who was often unjustly reviled by young advertising turks as a fussy creator of lists of rules responded as follows to that charge in Ogilvy on Advertising: "I hate rules . . . I may say to an art director 'research suggests that if you set the copy in black type on a white background more people will read it than if you set it in white type on a black background.' A hint, perhaps, but scarcely a rule." I therefore determined to make my volume a source of hints.

Two of these "hints" that I promoted quite emphatically were the avoidance of humor and celebrity presenters when dealing with serious cause subjects, such as crippling diseases.

However, in the words of noted Creative Director Paul Silverman (quoted in British Design & Art Direction's publication Copy Book ): "Anything brilliant can break any rule."

For an ad in a recent edition of the New York Times Magazine for the Michael J. Fox Foundation, the group quite understandably used their founder, the popular actor who is also afflicted by the disease.

Consistency of Image

But they have used him brilliantly, with a full understanding of his image, and the source of his most effective characterization. He is a short-of-stature actor with a wry sense of humor about it. Based upon his many comic portrayals, we have come to expect Michael to speak in that tone of voice. He has used it consistently even when describing the process of his disease.

And so, this ad isis not just a celebrity lending his fame to a cause; it is a celebrity with an intimate knowledge of the cause. He is speaking in a tone of voice that is consistent with his persona, and which, although it provokes a smile, (and is therefore memorable and intrusive,) seems quite appropriate to the serious intent of the ad, (which is to attract visitors to their web site, and contributors to their research fund.)

It should also be noted that the ad is consistent with Fox's courageous and almost matter-of fact attitude about his illness. The wry humor in his approach is in stark contrast with the "pathetic victim" portrayal employed by so many fund-raising ads for crippling diseases. Fox's confident and humorous approach makes him a very positive role model for all Parkinson's sufferers, and he is to be strongly commended for it.

This is the exception that breaks the rule, but it does it , as we have noted, brilliantly. Therefore, it is our "Pick of the Month!"

Previous Cause "Pick" of the Month

Massachusetts Department of Public Health "Rick Stoddard"

(See New Script Below)

Tough, gripping testimony of a grieving husband relating the final days of the life of his wife, a heavy smoker, who is unexpectedly diagnosed with incurable lung cancer at age 46.

In a remarkably moving series of spots, marked by strong, sure-footed testimony of this very centered but quietly distraught man, attention is focussed upon the serious nature of lung cancer, a preventable illness that receives very little publicity, but claims more women victims than breast cancer. Sources of "quitting" help, the ACS "Trytostop" hotline and website are supered at the end of the TV spot, and sympathetically pitched at the end of the radio commercials,

Rick Stoddard came to the attention of the anti-smoking campaign team at Arnold Advertising in Boston via an obituary written by Stoddard, in which he insisted in emphasizing lung cancer as the cause of death, a practice sometimes avoided by Funeral Parlors, the usual obituary writers.

A front Page story in the Worcester Telegram and Gazette about Marie's obituary and Rick's determination in articulating the cause was forwarded to the agency by the American Cancer Society, and the rest is history.

As Advertising Consultant to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, I admit to being present during the copy development and production stages, but if this campaign had been done anywhere else in the world, it would still have decisively qualified as a "Pick" for this site. Easily one of the strongest uses of real person testimony I have ever seen!

Rick Stoddard TV Script

"Forty-six years old"–:30

(One of a series of 7 produced by Arnold Advertising, Boston MA)

OPEN ON CU OF STODDARD

STODDARD (OC):

I'm Rick Stoddard.

CUT TO ALBUM PHOTO OF MARIE

That's my wife Marie.

BACK TO RICK :

She died from smoking cigarettes.

PHOTO OF RICK AND MARIE

She was forty-six years old.

CU RICK :

Forty-six!

ALBUM PHOTOS OF RICK,

MARIE, AND SON AT VARIOUS

FAMILY GATHERINGS

Now I look back on our lives together and I

keep coming back to . . . .

MS RICK (OC):

. . . she died at forty-six years old!

ALBUM PHOTO OF MARIE

HUGGING YOUNG SON

CU RICK :

I guess I never thought of twenty-three

As middle-aged!

TITLE:

MAKE SMOKING HISTORY

TITLE:

1-800-TRY-TO-STOP

Massachusetts Department of Public Health

Rick Stoddard TV Script #2

"Happy Face"–:30

(second of a series of 7 produced by Arnold Advertising, Boston MA)

OPEN ON SNAPSHOT OF MARIE

RICK STODDARD (VO):

My wife Marie used to smoke.

STODDARD OC:

After she was diagnosed with cancer . . .

she smoked even more.

SNAPSHOT OF RICK & MARIE

She got so weak I had to light her cigarettes for her.

BACK TO RICK, HOLDING LIGHTER

The lighter had a happy face on it . . .

A happy face!

MORE SNAPSHOTS

She asked me if she was dying . . .

RICK OC

And I told her "yes."

TITLES:

MAKE SMOKING HISTORY

Trytostop.org

Massachusetts Department of Public Health

SEND US YOUR" PICKS"

If you have recently produced some cause marketing of which you are particularly proud, contact Richard Earle, and we will arrange to review it for possible inclusion in our "Pick of the Month" series.