As we approach the end of Ramadan with less than 10 days ahead of us, I took all the time possible to wait for these brands to counter the damage that they have done to us over the past 20 days. Unfortunately, none of them redeemed themselves!
So now it’s time to crown the worst ads of the season:
Cottonil
Being the local underwear brand in the country, it was no surprise that Cottonil would take the local route in promoting its brand.
But Cottonil did more than that, they took the localized concept and threw it out of the window. With a series of very weak teasers that leave you not longing to keep track of what comes next, they come to us with the above copy.
A TVC that says nothing about the brand and humiliates Hany Ramzy by making him dance in his undies (a sight probably no one would want to see) while destroying a classic piece of Egyptian culture: Fouad El Mohandes‘ and Soad Hosny‘s musical from Ganab El Safir (1966).
What is even worse: They didn’t pay for the rights to the music, which is why the ad has been taken off air – thank the Lord! A stupidly produced ad that was wisely replaced with this copy below, which I think is a much better alternative.
But the damage has been done. The sight of Hany Ramzy’s thighs will probably stay in my memory for a while.
Bank Misr
A weak creative ad with bad humor is one thing, but an entirely stolen concept that has absolutely no cultural relevance is just absurd.
Riverdance rose to stardom in the mid 90s when introduced on stage at EuroVision by an Irish couple. So not only does it pertain to a certain culture, it is actually very specific to a certain family that has turned this type of dance into a business.
The relevance of this TVC to anything Egyptian has raised a lot of eyebrows and created a major wave of questioning and ridicule on social media. Even Abla Fahita has gotten on the bandwagon:
Recipe for failure: a bad song with inaudible lyrics and incoherent choreography that is not even in sync.
What really bothers me, actually, is the fact that for the past couple of years, the Bank Masr people have always come to us with pretty decent ads. Too bad they approved this concept this year.
Mega Cookies
So I took my sweet time with this, watched all the copies, over and over again, asked friends from inside and outside the industry what their thoughts on Nestle’s Mega campaign was… And I just couldn’t put my finger on what the problem was, thinking something must be wrong with me and I just cannot get it!
Turns out that everyone shares the same sentiments towards the Mega Cookies ads – a horrible set of commercials that have nothing to do with anything, really!
From standing at the edge of someone’s deathbed to getting robbed to Korean ping-pong… What are they trying to say here, seriously?
I’ll do my best to decipher the message here: Amongst all life’s pressures, Mega Cookies will take you out of whatever stressful situation you are in, while taking you on a chillaxed journey of indulgence…?
I think the team at Nestle thought that it would be a good idea to push the envelope a bit and take the risk with eccentric copy, like they did with the first Maxbon ad in 2012, but this one took it a bit too far!
The result? Major backfiring in Nestle’s face that dropped brand love to subzero levels in a jiffy… Sad!
WE SAID THIS: I’m not writing all of this to shoot someone in the foot, I hope the makers of these ads take this critique with an open heart, learn from it and return with a strong comeback next season.