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Reality: Old Spice sales are actually up 107% in the last month
- jdminhbg 16y agoI didn't follow up on the "sales are down" stories too much, but it did seem pretty hard to believe that they had data 48 hrs after the campaign ended.
- Elite 16y agoThe data from the story saying their sales were down was for the 52 weeks ending in April or May. And even those numbers were suspect, as there was another retail data source that said the opposite -- that sales were slightly up.. I never believed for a second that the latest campaign ended up as a LOSS.
- miah_ 16y agoProving once again that consumers are easily influenced.
- hugh3 16y agoI enjoyed the Old Spice ads so much that I considered going out and buying some just as a way of saying thanks. Call it a charitable donation to support the arts. (I still haven't actually bought any, though, as I still can't get over my mental image of Old Spice as "really cheap cologne.)
- Alex3917 16y agoCheap cologne with hormone disruptors. Have fun not being able to have kids if you wear it.
- amanfredi 16y agoCan you explain this at all?
- Alex3917 16y agoOld Spice contains chemicals called phthalates that bind to your estrogen receptors. Exposure to these chemicals is essentially like taking a low-level version of the hormone replacement therapy that transgendered people (sometimes) use. Among other things your sperm count dramatically drops and the sperm you have left are much less viable. Exposure to chemicals like those found in Old Spice are primarily why 1 in 5 couples are now considered infertile. (Even though the government keeps changing the definition of infertility to mask the massive reduction in reproductive viability, so in reality it's actually much worse than even the already shocking 1 in 5 statistic.) If you want to know more check out this video: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=375127 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=375127
- hugh3 16y agoI remain skeptical of the claims of "random internet guy" that "commonly used household product" is (without doubt) causing "horrible disease" and that "ban-happy government agency which is in charge of these sorts of things" hasn't got around to doing anything about it yet.
- Alex3917 16y agoWell if you had already read the academic literature for yourself then you wouldn't have to rely on a "random internet guy" for your health information. But if you're not willing to actually read the primary sources, the best you're going to get is second hand information. edit: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1280349/?tool=pmcentrez http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1280349/?tool=pm... http://www.mindfully.org/Plastic/Estrogenic-Phthalate-Esters.htm http://www.mindfully.org/Plastic/Estrogenic-Phthalate-Esters...
- mahmud 16y ago
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- MrRage 16y agoThese ads certainly had better aesthetics than most, but something dies inside me when an advertisement is considered art. I also don't understand why you would view buying Old Spice as a charitable donation.
- sorbus 16y agoThe whole thing with "support companies you like, provide positive feedback to business models and ideas you support." If you, as a consumer, support a method of advertising and want more companies to do it in the future, there are two main ways of encouraging it: writing a letter, or buying the product. Writing a letter and not buying the product encourages them, but doesn't factor into cost analyses; buying the product factors into cost analyses, and both writing a letter and buying the product (and mentioning that you bought it because of the advertisement in the letter) provides ammunition for anyone at the company who supports the advertising method. It's like the people who spent upwards of $500 on the Humble Indie Bundle: providing positive feedback to encourage things like it to happen in the future. Treating it as a donation doesn't make sense, of course, and I have to agree that advertisements shouldn't be considered art, except in the most dramatic examples. Perhaps the meaning of art is a bit narrow, though; advertisements can certainly be artistic.
- MrRage 16y agoIf you think Old Spice makes excellent deodorant, body washes or whatever then by all means support them with your wallet. But why buy a product just because you liked the commercial? I just see that as being suggestible. People didn't spend $500 on the Humble Indie Bundle so they would put out more ads did they? They wanted to support indie games, no?
- jasonlotito 16y agoI don't think anyone purchased their product just because of the commercial. Rather, these are individuals who possibly did in the past purchase Old Spice products, or Gillette products, or other well known brand name products they trusted. Now, when they go to buy these products again, they make a choice for Old Spice. A product they already like, but never made a real choice to buy. The commercials and publicity put Old Spice in their mind when they went to buy that type of product. Old Spice isn't trying to prove it has a good product. We know that. Rather, it's reminding us to make that choice Old Spice.
- sliverstorm 16y agoHave you considered that maybe it's not that Old Spice is really cheap cologne, but all the other stuff is stupidly overpriced cologne? The fact that most of the mainline colognes bear the name of extravagant product lines or music superstars should be a clue. As an example to support my argument, I'm in the process of making a classic cologne that requires some alcohol, (preferably very hard alcohol), some things from your spice cabinet, a few leaves, and more alcohol. I decided to grow my own leaves, and thus am currently in the 'grow the tree phase', but really that's not even necessary.
- mwerty 16y agoI want my cologne to be associated with expensive stuff, not economy.
- jasonlotito 16y agoI want my cologne to be associated with expensive stuff. I don't want my cologne to be expensive stuff.
- hugh3 16y agoIf you use enough cologne that you actually care how much it costs, you're using too much cologne, and I can probably smell you from here. A decent bottle might cost you sixty bucks, but it'll last years. Pennies per use.
- jasonlotito 16y agoI generally don't use cologne. =) But your point still stands, and is an interesting way of looking at it. I guess it's a case of not knowing if their really is a difference between the expensive stuff and the cheaper stuff.
- sliverstorm 16y agoI would rather my cologne made me smell good/pleasant, than wealthy. Wealth may well be a selection criteria, but I've no interest in trying to play that card.
- pxlpshr 16y agoI just use their body spray as deodorant because my body doesn't freak out over aluminum ingredients which is found in almost all solid products (causes me to sweat excessively)... I also find the brand more timeless, a lot less obnoxious than AXE which just screams Ed Hardy. ps. The markup on cologne/perfume is ridiculous, it's liquid gold and why so many celebrities release their own variation. Your impression of cheap is simply defined by luxury pricing and marketing.
- icey 16y agoIsn't the existence of the entire advertising / marketing industry predicated on being able to influence consumers?
- malbiniak 16y agoif consumers are so easily influenced, why do so many startups have a hard time influencing them?
- robryan 16y agoCustomers have never heard of them.
- wisty 16y agoMaking a hit ad can't be easy. Not if you want to outdo everyone else screaming for eyeballs. Google just did an SVG on a bunch of matrices to find the websites you'd most likely end up on if you randomly walked over the entire internet. It's deceptively simple, but only in retrospect.
- pkaler 16y agoDon't believe numbers from Nielson, NPD group, Marc, Ad Mob, etc. The only real numbers are GAAP that come out of the accounting department. This is true for Old Spice, iPhone vs Android, game consoles, etc.
- jacquesm 16y agoThat, and any campaign has the built in risk of simply driving a lot of sales forward, but not to increase the total sales volume by much, and that effect can only be established a long time after the campaign has run.
- llimllib 16y ago> Sales numbers are generally legit. We really dont do anything that would mess with those. via my brother at Nielsen, who whould happily tell me if the numbers were bull.
- TheAmazingIdiot 16y agoHmm. The guy is tremendous, the commercials are funny. And they're memorable. And I still dont like aldehyde based scents, and prefer my herbalist to make my own scents. They cost a bit more than normal, but last years. Guess that's the kind of people I associate with being a witch and all.
- khafra 16y agoWhat normal do they cost more than? I'm a big fan of Creed's Millisime Imperial and L'Artisan's Voluer de Roses, but if your herbalist could outdo those two in their own categories and last longer, I'd pay a bit more.
- TheAmazingIdiot 16y agoConsidering that I am not an herbalist, and only dabble in some aspects of oils and creams, I can somewhat answer that. Last I know she was in the Kansas City area going to Lillies War, part of the SCA. She travels the world for different botanicals, and buys else what she cannot retrieve. She extracts these botanicals herself. The last I heard, she had 6 different amber oils, all dependent on the amber used. The most impressive thing about this all is her: she can separate each individual scent from already-done compounds. And she has this cool ability that if she meets you, she 'knows' the perfect scent for you. I will see if I can get permission for me to give you her contact information. Usually after Lillies War, she's swamped.
- hugh3 16y agoAnd she has this cool ability that if she meets you, she 'knows' the perfect scent for you. Yeah, I met a used car dealer like that once.
- proexploit 16y agoThe percentage change may be questionable based on the objections raised by pkaler & jacquesm but I still think there's an obvious effect and it may not be just due to "easily convinced consumers". In the past, my impression of Old Spice was that it was old fashioned, for seniors, etc. I'm just one consumer, but if this was a common perception, it looks like Old Spice identified their weakness and targeted it. If you ask me today what my impression of Old Spice is, it's quite different. They're a company willing to make unique commercials and take some risks. They have new scents are targeted at a younger crowd (I remember seeing After Hours in stores) and I no longer view the company as "old" Old Spice. Even though my perception has changed, I don't view it as being convinced or tricked as a consumer, but a reinterpretation of a company based on their actions. I've been wrong before.
- khafra 16y agoA cologne purchase is different from a computer purchase or something in that if your peer group thinks it's cool, that actually does make it better than the alternatives. (edited to remove ambiguity)
- generalk 16y agoHow is that different from a computer purchase? See: Apple.
- hugh3 16y agoPerhaps should have said "a computer purchase among non-computer geeks".
- natep 16y agoStill wouldn't have made it true. Without any relevant data, I could speculate that non-techies are less likely to buy a computer based on technical merits, and more likely to decide based on what their friends have (especially technical friends that they could bum help off of)
- boredguy8 16y agoIf you like a commercial, odds are decent that it came from Wieden + Kennedy, perhaps most famous for creating "Just Do It". Remember: heading into the '90s, Reebok dominated Nike. The coining of "Just Do It" and the attendant campaigns were perhaps a major factor in propelling Nike to the forefront of their market. W+K also made Honda's famous "cog" commercial. They're also doing some work that may be interesting to the HN crowd over at http://www.wk.com/incubator http://www.wk.com/incubator. If I were a far more brilliant and creative person, I'd love to just hang out with their directors: they do a consistently good job in an area that's very hard to get right again and again over time.
- Goosey 16y agoIt is a little unclear from your post: are you just speculating that since it is a good commercial it came from W+K, or are you saying that it DID come from W+K in a roundabout way? It's really interesting to hear some of their past success, but randomly attributing any good campaign to them seems a little strange to me. :)
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- newmediaclay 16y agoThis campaign DID come from W+K. So did the "Write the Future" World Cup campaign.
- philwelch 16y agoIronically, the "write the future" World Cup campaign featured a bunch of players who, for the most part, played poorly in the World Cup, didn't make it past the first knockout stage, or in one prominent case (Ronaldinho) weren't even called up to their country's squad. Great commercial, though. Their "Take it to the Next Level" from two years ago was great too.
- william42 16y agoAccording to Wikipedia's page on W+K, these commercials did in fact come from theme.
- kadavy 16y agoI wonder what the campaign cost to run in comparison to these increased sales.