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With Further Ado #177: Speeding into Christmas

With Further Ado #177: Speeding into Christmas

Posted on by Ed Catto

As we speed ahead towards Christmas Day, either from a religious or commercial POV, I sometimes find it hard to slow down and actually enjoy the many events along the way. Too often my mind races ahead, eager to check off that mental to-do list rather than focus on the here-and-now.

With that in mind, I rescued a wonderful Archie Comic issue from a comic shop’s bargain box!  Wonderland Comics in Rochester, NY, always has so many scrumptious treasures available.

It’s Laugh #203 from February 1968, which means it was probably on sale around Christmas of 1967.  Veronica, Betty and Mr. Lodge are admiring a retailer’s window, which features paper dresses. This was a short-lived fad, popular from ’66 to ’68.  Current movie fans may have revisited this craze in the stylish new movie Last Night in Soho. It’s a brilliant movie and highly recommended.

Cover 4

Back when magazines were a big deal, advertising executives called the back cover “Cover 4”.  It was usually the most expensive ad page. The thought process was that readers had a 50-50 chance of seeing the front cover or the back cover.

Cover 4 for this issue features a wonderful Christmas Ad. It’s curious to readers today but certainly was “normal” back in the day.  Kids loved their bicycles a generation or two ago.  Bike ads, and ads for bike related items (tires, brakes, speedometers, etc.).

This ad, from the Stewart-Warner Instrument Division (obviously not named in hopes of creating Christmas “must-haves” for kids) for their Cadet Speedometer.  It’s a special speedometer that kids would put on their bikes.

Today, of course, bikers like me just use the Strava app.  Yes, there’s now an app that has replaced this product.

This wonderful ad has the Mad Men feel to it. It’s clever and upbeat. It’s not particularly inclusive to consumers who don’t celebrate Christmas, either. The copy [the words in the ad] were thoughtfully written and creatively designed, with an alternating placement, as if two speakers were “talking” (or singing?) to the reader.  And back in 1968, it was assumed that kids were going READ the damn ad. It wasn’t about one big graphic image and a logo; instead, it was about romancing the consumer with a conversation.

There’s no focus on product benefits here. This ad isn’t about the joy a bike rider can experience when she’s whooshing down a steep hill at top speed.  This ad is all about the product features instead. Continue reading “With Further Ado #177: Speeding into Christmas” →

With Further Ado #140: Vintage Marketing & The Power of Comic Book Storytelling

With Further Ado #140: Vintage Marketing & The Power of Comic Book Storytelling

Posted on by Ed Catto

“Bob West, Who IS This Woman?!?”

I am still enjoying, and sharing, my copy of Comics Ad Men by Stephen Brower. It’s a fantastic recent book, published by Fantagraphics, that celebrates the advertising work created by comic book artists like Neal Adams and Frank Robbins. I wrote about it recently here.

There’s a certain irresistible charm to those old ads. And that’s coming from someone who just loves new ads and all the innovative marketing that surrounds us today.  With that in mind, let’s take another look at vintage ads with a comic book connection.

The White Rock Fairy

The White Rock Company has been selling spring water for 150 years. The idea is that spring water, in this case from Waukesha, Wisconsin, is a little better for you than Royal Crown, Nehi or even Nesbitt’s sodas.  This independent company continues to innovate and keep afloat in an incredibly competitive market.  They are still independent.

Back in 1894, the company showcased a version of the Geek goddess Psyche as a spokesperson. She is often considered  the Goddess of Purity. That’s why they chose to use her in that iconic pose, leaning over a rock peering into a spring.   The corporate logo they created was based on the painting “Psyche at Nature’s Mirror” by German artist Paul Thumann.

The cynic in me can’t help but think that the strategy may have been more straightforward.  It doesn’t’ take a marketing genius to realize that a topless blonde is simply bound to be memorable.

In mythology, Psyche was gorgeous and that enraged her boyfriend’s mother, who happened to be Venus.  And when the Goddess of Love gets into a catfight with you, you know you have real problems. In the end, it all worked out and she married Eros. (Only he wasn’t a baby like you imagine when you use his other, more popular name: Cupid.)

The product itself, White Rock Seltzer, would enjoy an aura of glitziness, Celebrities of  yesteryear, including Gloria Vanderbilt (aka Anderson Cooper’s mom), Charles Lindbergh and the King of England, served White Rock in a showy way.

And that’s why this series of comic-style ads are so enchanting and perplexing. In the 1940s, White Rock launched this series of print ads, employing traditional panel-by-panel storytelling traditions (that’s comics to you, me, and Scott McCloud) to push the narrative forward. It looks like Holm Grey was the artist. Continue reading “With Further Ado #140: Vintage Marketing & The Power of Comic Book Storytelling” →