Tired Ads

I have been working my way through Hey Whipple, Squeeze This, by Luke Sullivan. I love advertising, but the repetition makes this a pretty slow read for me. Between the many comparisons of many ads, one thing has stuck out above all else: Mr. Whipple. Sullivan emphasizes how much everyone hated the Charmin character, Mr. Whipple, including the ad agency that had created him. People that saw the commercial hated him. Everyone wanted him dead. The character continued his reprimands for several years before finally leaving the screen, but never the heart of the consumer. To this day, ask that generation about Mr. Whipple and they reply with a groan. He's gone yet still hated.

So how could something this broadly despised continue for so long? Sales. Charmin was not always the TP tycoon we know and have welcomed into our homes and, more intimately, our bathrooms. Before Mr. Whipple, Charmin only controlled a fraction of the toilet paper industry. But once the enemy of the mid-show break came to be, sales went through the roof. The name recognition had reached an all-time high. Mr. Whipple became second only to Nixon for American image recognition. Everyone wanted him gone, but everyone knew his face. Charmin couldn't risk losing the popularity that Whipple created, so they wouldn't let the agency kill him, no matter how hard the agency fought for new campaigns.

So what was my #1 takeaway from this book? If you create a character or campaign that will get old after nine months, let alone nine years, don't do it.