NEWSLETTER #72 JUNE 11, 2017
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IMPROVING SOMETHING TO DEATH
A few months ago I wrote a piece about Dos Equis called "Stay Foolish My Friends."
Dos Equis' agency had fired “The Most Interesting Man In The World.” At the time, the campaign was certainly among the most well-known and best-loved campaigns of the first part of the century.
To my ear, over time, the campaign had lost some of its sparkle. It felt like the original writers of the campaign were no longer working on it.
But that didn’t seem to be a problem. The campaign was still going well and was still part of contemporary culture, despite my nitpicks.
However, there was apparently something bothering Dos Equis (owned by Heineken) -- the age of TMIMITW. They fired him claiming that they wanted to “contemporize” the campaign. We all know what that horseshit means — get rid of the old guy. It turns out that TMIMITW had committed the unpardonable sin of getting older.
Here in the US, about 42% of the adult population is over 50. In the ad industry under 6% of the population is over 50.
I’m sure there is a big fat powerpoint deck written by some cliché-spewing planner somewhere telling them that they had to “engage the millennial target” just as every strategic document is now required by law to say “engage the millennial target.”
So they hired a newer, younger TMIMITW. It has been a complete fucking disaster. The only time anyone mentions TMIMITW is to joke about how lame the campaign has become with the new guy.
Dos Equis identified a non-existent problem and force-fed it a unnecessary solution. Over the past few months their sales are lagging well behind other premium imported Mexican beers.
It is now only a few months since the newer, younger TMIMITW was introduced and last week the agency was fired.
There is a lesson to be learned from this episode. A great campaign is a fragile thing. Tweak a few things and you go from a huge hit to a big flop.
In advertising it’s easy to improve something to death.
