“Too colorful advertising.” “Too many woke agendas.” “An advertisement for cars, but without cars.” Some time has passed since the presentation of the new advertising campaign, but the criticism of it Jaguar he doesn’t say stop. Many fans of the traditional car industry, as well as car experts, feel annoyed.

And yet, this is a classic recipe rebrandingwhere a traditional product follows a groundbreaking marketing strategy to expand its audience. In this particular case the Jaguar spot, which was probably an advertising teaser, features young models, male and female, in sophisticated clothes in unusual colors (fire red, pink, electric yellow) and intense make-up. One could say that they are getting ready for the catwalk. Messages like “Live vividly” and “Don’t copy anything” appear. A car is nowhere in sight.

Does advertising have to be “provocative” to stand out in the ephemeral social media hype?

“It’s nothing new”

Guido Zurstige, professor of media at the University of Tübingen, points out that advertising that shocks or even goes beyond the usual is not something new, it is simply strengthened in the age of digitalization. A typical example of a controversial advertisement in the past was the campaign of the Italian company Benetton, which depicted an HIV-positive person and even occupied the Supreme Federal Court of Germany.

Later, Benetton caused a sensation with another “provocative” advertising campaign: in a photomontage collection, Angela Merkel was depicted giving a kiss on the mouth to Nicolas Sarkozy, but also Pope Benedict in a meeting with an imam.

In 2020, the German car manufacturer Volkswagen was also criticized for an advertising spot for the new Golf, in which a huge white hand is seen pushing a black man away from the shiny new model. The issue was raised by the company’s board of directors and an internal investigation followed, which concluded that there was no intent to engage in racist behaviour.

A legal issue or a matter of “taste”?

In Germany, consumers who feel offended by specific advertising messages can appeal to the Board of Ethics of the advertising industry (something similar to the Communication Control Board in Greece). In 2023 alone, 355 appeals were registered. Usually the protestors talk about discrimination based on gender or sexist attitudes. However, the erotic element in advertising is not considered sexist by definition. In addition, the head of the Ethics Council, Katia Heinzel von Heineg, clarifies, “we are not competent to judge everyone’s taste”.

Case in point: the smoothie company True Fruits launched an ad campaign with puns that contained explicit sexual overtones about the “oral pleasure” of its products. Some advertising platforms, such as German Railways and a city in southern Germany, refused to run the campaign. The company’s executives said, however, that what’s important is to boost the “brand profile” and they don’t care about any backlash.

“Challenge in advertising is allowed,” says Katia Heinzel von Heineg, however. The limit of the challenge was reached by an entry of the brewery Bitburger on Instagram in January 2023, with the timely occasion of the initiative “Dry January”, which advocates complete abstinence from alcohol for an entire month after the abuses that usually accompany the holidays from excessive consumption of food and drink. Bitburger’s advertising message depicted a pregnant woman enjoying alcohol-free beer.

Von Heineg points out that in this case the rules of the Ethics Council are not violated, since it is clearly a non-alcoholic drink. However, Bitburger had received criticism for this particular listing. But as the head of the Ethics Council emphasizes, “whoever provokes must also accept criticism. This is not a bad thing, it can even lead to an extremely constructive discussion.”

“The challenge is not an end in itself”

“The challenge cannot be an end in itself in advertising,” Matias Spetgens, Creative Director at Scholz & Friends advertising agency, estimates. “However, one has to look for new ways to attract the public’s attention, and usually those ways are out of the ordinary.”

Jaguar chief Rawdon Glover tells the Financial Times that his aim was not to launch a classic car commercial. And that’s because “if we did what everyone else does, we’d be ignored.”

There are also encouraging messages for Jaguar’s campaign. The comment in the industry magazine Horizont by Claudia Fischer-Appelt, Creative Director at the branding company Studio Karl Anders is typical: “Finally a relaunch that raises the spirits. Finally, a new thought, an authentic idea that looks ahead…”.

Edited by: Yiannis Papadimitriou