Canal and Broadway. All you Chisel-tippers and KRINKers go after it.

Almost a year after the L.A. City Council approved a moratorium on new off-site and supergraphic signs, and four months after it replaced that temporary measure with a permanent ban, advertisers and sign companies continue to wrap, hang, and otherwise display their multi-story supergraphic signs on the walls of buildings throughout the city.

So why are property owners and sign companies willing to risk open violation of the law, and advertising agencies and major corporations willing to look the other way?  The answer is easy to surmise from the fact that a large supergraphic in a high-traffic location can generate upwards of $50,000 in monthly revenue, while the maximum fine for violating sign law provisions is $100 a day.

The City Attorney’s office has filed at least two civil suits under a public nuisance provision that allows fines of up to $2,500 a day, but those lawsuits are slowly moving through the courts and any resolution is likely to be months away, if not longer, depending upon appeals.

In the meantime, absent any sudden displays of social and civic responsibility on the part of the outdoor advertising industry, expect to see the city’s public spaces occupied by more and more of these huge sales pitches demanding the attention of everyone driving, walking, bicycling or otherwise moving past them.

via Sign Companies, Property Owners, Advertising Agencies, Major Corporations Thumb Their Noses at L.A.’s New Off-Site Sign Ban.

“For sale” realty signs are a familiar sight in post-real-estate-bubble Williamsburg. It was only a matter of time until some super clever ad exec co-opted this ubiquitous format for some good ol’ guerilla marketing. Well folks, that time has come. And the product for sale (a tv show which features Courtney Cox as a predatory “older” woman ) looks pretty ill-considered as well:

In a neighborhood already awash in actual foreclosure signs and vacant luxury condos, this is almost certainly meant to be a sick joke, right? Or else, borne out of some new type of cynical, afflicted optimism (“in sadness/opportunity,” “if lemons/lemonade,” etc.)? What will the neighbors think, after all?

In an interesting twist of unintentional comedy (or postmodern self-realization?), the content of the show follows a similar thematic trend:

Courtney Cox’s needy female protagonist [Is To] Sadness^TM

AS

Meaningless flings with young studs [Is To] Opportunity^TM

It is an “empowering!^TM ” analogy.

Very disappointing stuff, considering the dearth of middle-aged female characters on TV. I guess they were just waiting for the right demeaning stereotype to come along…

Will someone please call that 877 number and see if the place is really for sale?

Bonus: Funny banter on the subject of the confusing “pumas/cougars/mountain lions” thing by The Hater podcast.

Update: Following the recent Brownstoner post on the faux-real estate/faux-cougar ads, several commentators questioned the signs’ legality. The NYC Department of Buildings prohibits signs at residential addresses that advertise products unrelated to that address, but permits signs that “direct attention to a business at the same location as the sign.” In other words, a [legitimate] “For Sale, Call Realtor” sign is permissible, while leasing your yard to Verizon (so they can shave their logo into the grass) would be illegal. This-parody-of-the-real-thing is ultimately NOT the real thing would inevitably fall into the illegal advertising category. See NYC’s Outdoor Sign Guidelines and the city’s definition of “Advertising Signs” for more information.

The lamppost with all the flyers for music shows says “Dont Advertise” but… do they mean, don’t advertise anything other than indy rock. Or does no one care?

At first we thought that the Ginger Ale was listed as Sugar Free because it has Corn Syrup in it, not real Sugar. That would have been some amazing mislabling. Instead, they just ran out of the diet version, and slid everything over. Kind of a let down, but still funny.

The antique store has its new antiques, delivered in a new container from china. Oh, authenticity.

And the Mens Multi. So much for the rumors that it doesn’t exist.

And last but not least, this young woman was go-go dancing in her red-white-blue underwear on the street corner in NW Portland trying to get people to come into the lingerie shop for a big sale. Sex sells, but is that really how bad the economy is, that the company is that desperate, and the young woman is that willing to… dance near-naked on the street for money? I mean, I wholly approve dancing naked on the street for fun, but for money, its just a whole other thing.

This really doesn’t make any sense at all to me.

These stencil ads are spray-painted around my neighborhood in Brooklyn. They’re for a Virgin America campaign. I know this because I fly Virgin America. Of course I’m very reluctant to remotely endorse any commerical product on this site, I gotta tell the truth here; I fly more than most people, I have flown a lot of airlines, and Virgin is better than most. If I can choose, I choose to fly Virgin because airlines like Northwest and US Airways are garbage in comparison. That’s not really my opinion, that’s just a fact. So full disclosure, I have a frequent flyer account with Virgin, I love that I can plug in my laptop under every seat, and I was tickled when I noticed your entertainment system runs on Linux.

Virgin America people, I know you are gonna read this, so what I am trying to tell you is I already like your company.  One can easily look around this site and get the wrong idea – we are not idealogues here at the Anti-Advertising Agency. We’re principled while knowing we don’t live in a fantasy world – it’s a subtle difference.

I also understand Virgin has a certain image – I’m supposed to think of you as rebelious, rock’n'roll, and irreverent, but also you want to provide better service and a quality product.

So why are you stenciling my neighborhood with your advertising?

I imagine you hired some cool marketing company that “understands” the “youth and urban market” like Shephard Fairey’s BLKMRKT?  BLKMRKT makes sense because you decided to riff off the whole chinese/russian propaganda thing with your “Flydealists Unite” campaign. (Unfortunately no once seemed to notice that BLKMRKT has been doing that for about 10 years and it’s getting stale.) Y’all probably thought you could associate Virgin with revolution and waving red flags.  You’d embrace the contradiction with the communist imagery because you’re cool! And anyone who disagrees is old! But of course imagery isn’t enough – someone said “we gotta have a street component” and that was put in the budget.

And no one fucking thought it through.

Graffiti is polarizing – it puts people in two groups. People who like graffiti and stencils don’t like corporate stuff.  They really, really don’t. The other group is people who don’t like graffiti: they don’t understand it and they despise it.

There is no one else.

So when you spray your campaign all over the neighborhood, you piss off the street art people and you piss off everyone else. It’s a lose/lose situation.  No one except the “creatives” who worked on the campaign and the people who signed off on it think it is cool.

It’s also illegal, but you clearly don’t care about that.

Perhaps you’re having that “there’s no such thing as bad press” thought. “At least our message is received” right? Of course it’s recieved – because we can’t ignore it after you sprayed it in our public space. But it’s received with disgust and irritation by everyone.  NO ONE LIKES IT EXCEPT YOUR CREATIVES. As I said before, I already like your company, and tagging my neighborhood isn’t helping. Why are you doing it?

So just stop.

As a strategy, it doesn’t make sense and it’s not working. Stay away from public space. Stick to print, video, and web (I know, I know, it doesn’t sound as fun or edgy and your ad guys will complain). But even smarter, just stick to being a better airline – that’s already working.

Please just stop with the fake revolution, stencil in the street bullshit. We’re all smarter than that.

Just a suggestion,

Steve Lambert

We have to dump all of our water, in some cases women are being forced to remove their undergarments, and of course we all have to take off our shoes, now we are forced to look at ads in the process. Not that the security check point was a particularly sacred or peaceful place anyway, but man, seeing those really bright ads at that moment is not the kind of branding they want. I’m thinking: “damnit, I hate shoes right now.” And then I have to stare into a box that is telling me “you love shoes. you need shoes. buy more shoes.”

1. “Bomb-proof” trash cans in London – Part of “bomb proofing” a trash can includes attaching television that plays ads on the side.  How many trash cans are exploding in London? What ever happened to David Yassky’s proposal to bring ads to Brooklyn’s trash cans?
2. This guy Dan Paluska has a nice brief post that ties together diamonds, advertising, and John Lennon all in in about 4 paragraphs.  Go see how he does it.
3. Yes Magazine wrote a handy “how-to guide” that includes some of our work.
4. Apparently in Canada, all advertising is true.
5. This ad says “Life is too short, get a divorce” (ouch!)  City has it removed.
6. I was happy that the NEA’s 50 million was part of the stimulus plan until I read about this stupid f-22 jet. Creative folks gotta stop putting up with being shafted.  This guy has a good take on it too.

So apparently Butterfinger doesn’t think Chicagoans value the surface area of their skulls. Next Thursday the candy bar is making a desperate plea for attention by inviting folks to a Chicago barbershop to shave their heads and have a Butterfinger logo “spray painted” onto their scalp. All for a measly $100 “gift card”, presumably only to be used for purchasing nasty caffinated candy bars. Good luck with this one Nestle. If you go to Butterfinger’s website you can check out pictures of some of the tools who’ve already leased ad space on their crainiums.

(I figured I’d save you the trouble of going to Butterfinger’s website and posted the images below. I’m guessing everyone in these photos is an intern for the marketing company that came up with this. – Steve)

Also, anyone notice that the caffeinated candy bar is “limited edition?” I think that’s a euphemism for “a product failure humiliation safety net.”

Ironically, from an article titled 10 things that won’t survive the recession

via “The Triumph of Bullshit” on Tumblr