This is the ad copy for Glade's Clean Linen Air Infusion Spray. (click the "Sunny Memories" link to get the full text.)The scent of Glade Clean Linen brings back memories of childhood. It evokes the song a grandparent hummed while pulling fresh sheets and towels off clotheslines on a warm afternoon. It recalls summer days spent lying on the grass watching clouds drift lazily overhead, the sound of screen doors swinging shut, the joy of teaching a dog to play catch. It reminds us of country visits, running barefoot through a sprinkler and catching fireflies. As someone once wrote, "A clothesline holds our history, our personal stories, the progression of our families, the color and texture of our lives revealed in the clothing we hang on the line."As if anything would remind you of "the sound of screen doors swinging shut" when your spraying the bathroom full of some chemical in order to cover up the evidence of your latest activity.
But I have to wonder, what sort of hack came up with this tripe? And he got paid for it!
Oh gawd. Blow me.
14 comments:
I often wonder about the people who write this kind of copy. Are they sniggering up their sleeves as they type?
Isn't it atrocious?
In order to evoke so many memories from a spray bottle the writer must have been a huffer in younger days.
It sounds like something Don Draper would have written.
Specifically, it reminds me of his brilliant pitch for the Kodak Carousel.
Smells do linger in the memory for a long time. There was a really good Old Spice commercial where the girl's boyfriend is being a jerk and she smells his shirt and it takes her back to all the good times they had.
From my own experience, for instance, whenever I give the apartment the once-over with Clorox and then come home that night, it reminds me of the swimming pool at the little town I grew up in in the Summer. Scents can invoke a Proustian nostalgia, I guess is what I am saying.
Zen,
Now we know why Proust shut himself up in his room. He was a huffer.
Kudos to Fool.
RJ
All you need is Mary's dress waving, and you have Bruce Springsteens Thunder Road.
When I was an ad copy writer I pulled shit like this all the time simply to alleviate my boredom. I was awfully fond of writing long alliterative sentences just to see if anyone was actually paying attention to the text. They were.
@ RJ:
:-) Did they have Johnson & Johnson products in post-War France? Because when I burn a Glade scented candle I don't want to leave my room either.
PS--The copywriter dude starts getting lazy at "Angel Whispers"--there is a contest to submit the copy, i.e., do his job for him:
It's HERE.
PPS--on "Hawaiian Breeze" (my personal favorite), it looks like the copywriter just Cut & Pasted a Wikipedia article on the history of white people in Hawaii.
WTF?
Never met me a dog in my life that didn't know how to play catch. We took our sheperd out to the park once, with water, just to see how long he'd fetch. We played for for probably a little over an hour, when we bagged it. He was deliriously happy, but it was obvious he would never stop.
Generally speaking, we all smelled pretty bad.
Remember the "Quarry" cereal commercial from early SNL? Jane Curtin as Sally Housewife holding a box of rocks and saying " I know it's all natural cuz' it's mined!"
my people will be in touch with you about the copyright violations obrien
On the Glade's Page it says "select a scent". Are you people over there having computers you can smell on already???
Just wondering ;)
These potty sprays are a universe unto themselves. I imagine their admen are saddled with the same unenviable task as the TP marketers, and it can be fun to see the intricate lengths they go to to get you to spend. Like the cartoon bears who don't fucking use toilet paper debating the length, strength, texture and lint quotient of something you wipe your ass with. While essential at the time of need, I don't really spend enough time with my wad of toilet paper to evaluate its' merits before I flush it away.
If Phil Hartman were alive, he'd do a super commercial that said Simply:
"Poop.
Flowers.
Poop AND Flowers."
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