Commentary

Find the Pickles!: Claussen Caps Goofy Video Series With Goofier Facebook Picture Contest

Sometimes you wish social media had never been invented. Hasn't the poor consumer been drafted into enough goofy marketer ideas in an endless series of ploys designed to "involve the consumer" in the creative? To wit: the auto ads where an unsuspecting car owner is led into a press conference. His sole purpose, other than to deliver a predictable sound bite, is to look suitably dazed and confused just to convince us of the ad's "authenticity."

And so it goes with Claussen Pickles' series of Web videos. Launched in June and refreshed with new episodes every few weeks since, the "Journey to the Claussen Pickles" series tries to dramatize the freshness of the brand's pickles by showing shoppers to the refrigerator aisle where they live. Supermarket explorer Sir Edwin Horsham leads the way on a dog sled fronted by some inanimate huskies (perhaps frozen, but I suspect stuffed). All is well and goofy until Sir Edwin grabs a civilian, an apparent real-life shopper he plants on the sled for the journey. In its most recent iteration, they confront a surly Polar Bear in the paper goods aisle who tossed a stack of TP in their path. Through all of this (and following the model for every consumer ambush ad) the consumer looks uncomfortable and sporting a polite grin. The scenes end with the consumer and Sir Edwin being photographed upon finding the pickles. The poor shopper seem as unconvinced and only marginally amused by the setups as we are, which really makes me wonder about the point of these things.

At any rate, also like most serialized Web video ads, curiosity and press attention fuels interest in the first episode  (1.1 million YouTube views), which wanes quickly (18,000 views for last week's video).  

Given the ending of the various Web videos the series seems to have been aimed at the Facebook contest that started just recently. Visitors to Claussen's Facebook page are invited to upload their own photos in front of the Claussen's refrigerated pickle section of their local store. You too can sport an uncomfortable grin, fill out a long registration form, and figure out how you are going to get the image you probably took on your phone to the PC for uploading to Facebook. They weren't kidding when they called this a "Journey."

The campaign was designed by The Escape Pod/Chicago, and the creative and messaging all seem to be in the right place. Somehow there just seems to be too many hoops for the consumer to jump through to get to that point, however, and this viewer is left with the same polite grin as the unfortunate folks strapped to the sled.

By the way, apparently they filmed these bits in a New Jersey supermarket. Maybe, but not the Jersey I was born and raised in. In my Jersey the shopper would not have grinned blankly while agreeing to sit on a fake dog sled. He or she would have demanded a rev share on any pickles sold via the ad...right after he cold cocked the jackass in the polar bear suit.  
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