Life!

I remember when I was a kid and having Buttercup tell me to turn my bread upside down. Why? Because the taste buds are on the top of your tongue – “Taste it, don’t waste it.” Thousands of kids were eating their slices of bread upside down (which turned out to really annoy parents who would find condiments like honey both on little fingers and dripped onto kitchen floors.

Of course there is no scientific proof to back up turning your bread upside down to not waste any of the taste but when you are seven you couldn’t care less and if it was on the television it must be true. It was a good advertising idea. In the the seventies we were dazzled by all sorts of great stuff right up to the tanned people rolling about in a giant ball at the beach having the times of their lives because at the end we discovered Coke wasn’t just a black fizzy drink – it actually added life! It was huge. We were sold stuff down our gullets like pelicans gobbing fish and we couldn’t get enough. We were in it for the show. We wanted to be entertained and considering what advertising was like before, the seventies were fabulous. But finished.

Today persuading kids to turn their bread upside down must be related to the branding experience and to develop such an experience the users want to be involoved from the start. It’s faster and more savvy than ever before and although I doubt we will see any seven year olds in R&D to bring their input to the bread experience one never knows.