I can only wonder what they were thinking at Avis's advertising agency or in the boardroom when the company's managers got to see their new campaign promoting iTunes downloads as a premium for renting from them.
"OK, this black guy approaches the counter, opens his mouth, and 'I Wanna Rock' come blaring out!"
And the poor guy behind the counter just looks dumbfounded until he's rescued by a female co-worker who opens HER mouth and...."
Didn't anybody jump up and yell, "LAME!"
What makes this incredibly stupid is how these people are, I guess, supposed to be living music players of some sort. I don't know...are they radios? MP3 players? Oh, maybe they're iPods! But...why? And what does music coming out of their mouth have to do with him renting a car and her explaining where it's parked? Totally stupid. Actually embarrassing.
I also don't get the idea of offering iTunes downloads for rentals. It's nice, and I am an Avis customer who enjoys getting this little reward for renting. But you've got to be at least 25 years old to rent a car. That cuts out a lot of people who own iPods and download from iTunes. It seems they could have come up with something that fits their demographic a bit better.
Remember a syndicated series of television commercials a few years ago for radio station? They featured an incredibly attractive woman who lip-synced a rapid montage of music and DJ banter. It was so perfect. Completely in sync and actually totally believable. It ended with an announcer saying, "You have an incredible mouth." And she responds with, "We have an incredible radio station." The only problem was you never had any idea which station it was promoting because the technique completely overpowered the message. At at least one station in every major market used it at one time or another.
Nevertheless, Avis should go back and watch these commercials to see how effective unexpected sounds coming out of someone's mouth in a TV commercial can be. This one, where they just stupidly gape at one another while music comes from somewhere, is pathetic. Come on, Avid...please try harder!
If you want to watch the whole thing, it's available on YouTube. Prepare to cringe.
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