ads

Wow, have times change in the advertising industry. I can recall a period of time when advertisements, whether it was seen on television, listened heard on the radio or featured in a magazine newspaper etc.., would actually feature the product. Now day’s theses advertisement may only feature a catchy phrase in efforts of gaining the attention of the consumer. “The argument here is that advertisements used to tell us how valuable and useful a product was.” (Strinati 214). Sometimes these advertisements make sense, other times I'm simply left wondering. Strinati, goes on to explain modern day advertisements, “they say less about the product directly, and are more concerned with sending up or parodying advertising itself by citing other adverts, by using references drawn from popular culture and by self-consciously making clear their status as advertisements.” (Strinati 214).

The contemporary advertisement print I chose to analyze for this exercise was Mercedes Benz advertisement I stumbled across during one of my weekly readings of Cosmo while on the toilet. The Mercedes advertisement actually took up two pages in the magazine, yet the actual car product was not even featured no where in the two pages. There was the Mercedes Benz logo in the sky, similar to the Batman logo, the Benz symbol was inserted into the moon as people walked the streets. I the logo symbolized Mercedes Benz was a savior for car or possibly the car amongst cars to have. The advertisement was simply unexplainable and didn’t make sense to me.

For clarification purposes I thought it would be best to surf the web of old automobile advertisements, specifically Mercedes Benz ads, in effort of seeing the difference in the advertisement history. As I looked at older ads, they all seemed to have one thing in common, the actual product was there. It was interesting that the advertisement was plain, simply having a white or black background and the car. There was nothing fancy about these advertisements at all.

I think the time period in which were in now, the car really doesn’t have to be present for individuals to be interested in the advertisement. Seeing that Mercedes Benz are known as one of the most popular luxury cars that are affordable for a middle class person, it doesn’t take much effort on the Mercedes Benz part to sell their product. “Although the intention is still to sell, it is contended that nowadays the postmodern effect is achieved by seemingly overt efforts within advertising to undermine this purpose.” (Strinati 215). I think it’s more acceptable for ads with the popularity of a Mercedes Benz, or a Coke cola. I say this because they products have been apart of our lives forever and with the popularity in which they have gained we recognize and accept them as a part of culture, which leads to advertisement company putting out these ads such as the one I mentioned in this blog. Ads have and will be around forever. I think one, were comfortable with the product and two, the advertisement writers are running out of ideas to sell their product.