Judith Roman

Many years ago when I first moved to the South I saw an ad on television that I found to be very funny but as years progressed I came to the realization that it was offensive. The Kentucky Fried Chicken commercial featured the “Colonel.” Every time he spoke there would be captions translating what he said in English. By the way, the Colonel spoke English with a southern drawl. The commercial aired for a short period of time and suddenly it was gone. I question the effectiveness of running this commercial in the south where it came across as silly or even offensive.

A few years later I saw an Uncle Ben’s commercial for Mexican fajitas. It depicted a woman coming down some stairs with a red flamenco dress and castanets on her hands. Then it said “try our Mexican fajitas – you will feel as though you are there”. That would be fine if the flamenco dancer was from Mexico. So I decided to write to the Uncle Ben’s manufacturer and comment on the marketing research that was done prior to writing and filming this ad.

The marketing department failed to do their “homework.” Flamenco dancers are from Spain. If they had researched they would have known that the traditional theme in Mexico as far as music is concerned would be Mariachi. Fajitas are Mexican cuisine not Spanish. I let them know that they were actually offending two different Spanish-speaking nationalities.

Marketing is a specialized field that requires research not only to promote the product but also to make sure it does not cause negativity towards the company due to cultural incompetence or even discriminatory perception such as the Aunt Jemima controversy where the marketing department had to change the “look” so as not to make Aunt Jemima look like a maid. Marketers face a challenging task trying to make ads that are appealing, non-offensive and also promote the product well enough for success.

Can you share an ad that was offense from a cultural standpoint?

Graphic Credit:
Animationfactory.com