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When marketing goes terribly wrong! Join us as we explore the advertisements that sparked outrage, controversy, and swift removals from circulation. From tone-deaf takes on social issues to shocking racial insensitivity, these commercials had viewers reaching for their pitchforks instead of their wallets. What were these companies thinking?
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00:00Twitter erupted overnight, with tweets like,
00:02I've been studying commercials for 30 years.
00:05Kendall's Pepsi ad is legitimately the worst one I've ever seen.
00:09Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for commercials and ads that
00:13garnered a massive negative public response.
00:15Some were even pulled from circulation.
00:17Think of Sydney Sweeney in those great jeans she wears by American Eagle, if you will.
00:22But just so we're clear, this is not me telling you to buy American Eagle jeans.
00:26Sydney Sweeney has her jeans.
00:28You see what I did there, right?
00:30Number 10.
00:32Underage Modeling Accusations.
00:34Calvin Klein.
00:35What is it about clothing that often makes for such risque marketing?
00:39Did you ever live on the streets?
00:40No.
00:42Parents took very good care of me.
00:44This 1990s denim campaign featured models that looked like teens,
00:48posing suggestively in a wood-paneled basement.
00:50In one of the commercials, a person behind the camera even asked them to undress.
00:55You think you could rip that shirt off of you?
00:56Parent groups, religious groups, child welfare organizations, and many others reacted negatively.
01:09Some threatened boycotts.
01:11The U.S. Justice Department's child exploitation and obscenity section even looked into Calvin Klein.
01:16President Bill Clinton said the models were half-dressed adolescents.
01:20The commercials were removed from circulation, and Calvin Klein placed an ad in the New York Times saying they were taken aback by the negative response.
01:27You've been on the spot before.
01:29Not like this.
01:31Ah!
01:32This talk shot.
01:34Number 9.
01:35Bob Johnson's Super Bowl commercial.
01:37Holiday Inn.
01:38New nose, $6,000.
01:41Lips, $3,000.
01:43New chest, $8,000.
01:46This ad got negative attention at the worst possible time, a Super Bowl.
01:50In the ad, a tall blonde woman enters her class reunion and draws lots of stares.
01:55A male attendee cringes at realizing he knew her as Bob Johnson.
01:59And then, the voiceover says,
02:01It's amazing the changes you can make for a few thousand dollars.
02:04It compares the quality of staying at this hotel chain to the impact of a person's gender transition.
02:10The 1997 Super Bowl advert got plenty of buzz, and not all of it good.
02:14Some members of the queer community approved of the gesture.
02:17Others found it offensive and mocking.
02:19Maybe it was ahead of its time?
02:21Swing and miss, Holiday Inn.
02:22Imagine what Holiday Inns will look like when we spend a billion Holiday Inns.
02:26Number 8.
02:27Talking Pandas.
02:29Sales Genie.
02:30A commercial or ad campaign missing the mark is bad enough,
02:33but this one really didn't need to do any of what it did.
02:36We have no customers, no sales.
02:38We're going out of business.
02:39Sales Genie, a marketing company, ran an ad during the 2008 Super Bowl
02:43showing a family of pandas that spoke in highly stereotypical Asian accents.
02:47Panda Psychic!
02:48Help!
02:49We need customers!
02:50Tell Ling Ling to get 100 free sales leads at SalesGenie.com.
02:54That depiction would be bad enough already for its racial insensitivity.
02:58But the family was also struggling to keep their business,
03:00called Ling Ling's Bamboo Furniture Shack afloat.
03:03They had stereotypical names, too.
03:05It makes sense that many people didn't respond well to this commercial.
03:08The CEO opted to take it off the air,
03:10telling the New York Times at the time,
03:11we never thought anyone would be offended.
03:14Hey, kids!
03:14You want to go see the grizzly bears at the zoo?
03:16For 100 free sales leads, go to SalesGenie.com!
03:19Number 7.
03:20Kissing Priests.
03:22Benetton.
03:22This high-end clothing brand was already known for getting people talking with its advertising.
03:27I mean, do you think Benetton did this because they knew that it would cause controversy?
03:30Benetton has forever in their ad campaigns been very provocative.
03:33As part of their Unhate campaign in 2011,
03:36the company made doctored photos of world leaders kissing each other on the lips.
03:40This included pairings of the then-U.S. president with his Chinese counterpart,
03:45as well as smooches between religious figures.
03:47The Vatican and spokespeople from other religious groups slammed the imagery,
03:51saying it was blasphemous.
03:53Politicians, nobody cares about them, but religious stuff?
03:57Yeah, it's a bit more complicated.
04:00United Colors of Benetton stated that the ads were meant to challenge perspectives
04:04and promote kindness, but the images ended up getting pulled away.
04:08Admittedly, it's unclear what the campaign had to do with clothes.
04:11Today, with this campaign, we want to create a new energy toward tolerance,
04:17respecting the others, and finding the elements in common,
04:21rather than the elements that separate you from the others.
04:24Number 6.
04:25White is Purity.
04:26Nivea.
04:27It was intended to promote the brand's invisible for black and white deodorant,
04:31which is supposed to keep marks off dark clothes.
04:34But things quickly went terribly wrong.
04:37It makes sense to emphasize that a skincare product is invisible,
04:40that it doesn't leave stains on clothes specifically.
04:43But Nivea missed the mark, and in fact, left one with this marketing tactic.
04:47Here we go again.
04:48Another beauty company telling black women to lighten and whiten their skin.
04:52This time, the culprit is the skincare company, Nivea.
04:55The brand ran a social media ad with a tagline that read,
04:58White is Purity.
04:59Keep it clean.
05:00Keep it bright.
05:01Don't let anything ruin it.
05:02The promotion was primarily targeted at audiences in the Middle East.
05:06News outlets worldwide, including the New York Times, The Guardian,
05:09the BBC, and more, cover the controversy.
05:13Nivea issued a statement acknowledging the misstep, and retracted the ad.
05:16Not all publicity is good publicity, and purity is not the same as cleanliness.
05:21Both the Nivea UK and Nivea USA Twitter accounts have been replying to people apologizing.
05:27Number 5.
05:28Sometimes, lighter is better.
05:30Heineken.
05:31In 2018, Heineken ran one of those commercials that makes you wonder how many people approved
05:35of it beforehand.
05:36Ah, Heineken, why?
05:41What were you doing?
05:43Here's a scene.
05:44A light-skinned bartender passes a woman a beer, which breezes past other patrons first.
05:49The hang-up was that the woman was white as well, while the people the bottle slid by
05:53were black.
05:54A low-calorie beer can be a great option, but that has nothing to do with the drink's
05:57color, or the color of anything, or anyone else for that matter.
06:01Oh, also, reggae music was playing in the commercial.
06:10Heineken's odd combination of tagline and imagery has celebrities talking, with people
06:15like Chance the Rapper calling it out on X at the time.
06:18When an ad's hook implies that light things are better than dark things, it might need
06:22a bit of revision.
06:23I almost wonder if it's really an accident, you know?
06:26Like, all these ads, because you realize with DVRs and streaming, people can just skip
06:29commercials now, right?
06:30The only time we get to see ads is when they show up in the news for being racist.
06:34Number four.
06:35Innocence is sexier than you think.
06:37Loves baby soft.
06:39What exactly is meant to be attractive about naivete?
06:42This commercial from 1975 was pitching a line of personal hygiene products, including
06:47body mist and lotion.
06:48Soft powdery scents are definitely a selling point, but the ad opens by saying babies are
06:57irresistible.
07:01It then shows a grown woman in a youthful baby doll style dress, licking a lollipop suggestively.
07:08The male narrator describes the products as having the innocent, clean scent of a baby
07:13that grew up to be very sexy.
07:15It's unclear who this is supposed to appeal to, especially as the viewer is forced to
07:19watch the woman stare into the camera while she enjoys her candy.
07:23Innocence isn't sexier than we think.
07:26Because innocence is sexier than you think.
07:28For your baby at Christmas.
07:31Number three.
07:32We believe the best man can be.
07:33Gillette.
07:34It's sometimes said that no good deed goes unpunished.
07:37This could describe Razor Company Gillette's 2019 commercial touching on toxic masculinity.
07:41We can't hide from it yet.
07:43Sexual harassment is taking over.
07:45It's been going on far too long.
07:49We can't laugh it off.
07:51The messaging calls on men to lift each other up and do more to address bad behavior.
07:55It even switches up their famous tagline going from the best a man can get to the best a
08:00man can be.
08:01Gillette also pledged to donate millions of dollars over three years to non-profits supporting
08:05relevant causes.
08:06It's by bringing out the best in others that we truly become our best.
08:13Gillette.
08:13However, many news outlets and thousands of viewers didn't respond well, seeing the ad
08:18as dismissive of traditional male values or traits.
08:21Eventually, the dislikes outweighed the likes on YouTube.
08:24Thousands of people have hit the dislike button on Facebook.
08:27I have a problem, a real problem, with what I believe to be this new kind of war on masculinity.
08:34Number two, Real Beauty Campaign, Dove.
08:38This long-running ad series pushed the message of body positivity by featuring ethnically and
08:43physically diverse models.
08:44But in 2017, Dove missed big on Facebook.
08:47And this was a tone-deaf ad that I felt like it is a four-point representation of colorism in
08:54the world.
08:55The three-second clip showed a black woman changing out of a shirt in a color similar to
08:59her skin tone.
09:00A white woman in a white shirt is revealed in her place, who also changes shirts to become
09:05a woman with another skin tone.
09:06The message tried to be a reminder that all humans are inherently beautiful.
09:10The Facebook ad was really just meant to be something a bit more fun, a slightly different
09:16creative concept.
09:17The message is that we, you know, we're all different and we look different, but the product
09:22is the same and it works on all of us.
09:25But instead, it made viewers offended, seeing the ad as racially insensitive at worst and
09:31confusing at best.
09:32Outlets such as Gawker and CNN, as well as thousands of commenters, sounded off angrily.
09:37Dove issued a formal apology, but the damage was done.
09:40The 60-year-old company getting more backlash for that explanation.
09:45Movie director Ava DuVernay writing,
09:47You can do better than miss the mark.
09:50Deepens your offense.
09:51Do better here.
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10:06Number one, live for now moments, Pepsi.
10:11But many are noting the similarity between the image of Jenner and the officer to this
10:16widely circulated photo of Black Lives Matter protester Aisha Evans when she approached police
10:21at a demonstration in Baton Rouge.
10:23A celebrity in an ad can help promote a product.
10:26It's also helpful to tap into current events.
10:28However, Pepsi made a bad move in 2017 with their commercial featuring Kendall Jenner and
10:33the Black Lives Matter movement.
10:35In it, the famous model and her friends enter a protest, which is framed like a relaxing stroll.
10:41Jenner hands a Pepsi to one of the law enforcement officers to try and connect with him.
10:46The commercial had a casual air and seemed to undermine the seriousness of BLM and police
10:51brutality.
10:52So the whole thing is sort of an homage to the Black Lives Matter movement?
10:55Don't even touch it.
10:56It'd be insane to touch it.
10:58Right.
10:58Okay.
10:59Don't even show police.
11:00It was only around for a single day before it was pulled, but it was almost universally
11:05mocked.
11:06Lesson to other brands.
11:07Don't trivialize a difficult issue, even if you're using someone famous.
11:11I think they're going to pull it.
11:12I don't think they can withstand this kind of abuse.
11:14I think every time it comes on, it's just going to be one, you know, joke after another.
11:18I mean, I admire the fact that they're defending it, but I just don't see how it goes on like
11:20this.
11:21What ads have you seen that made your jaw drop in a bad way?
11:24Let us know in the comments.
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