Tuesday, 17 February 2009

Mad

I caught a long, tedious and obviously very expensive TV commercial last night. Bruce Willis, Elle MacPherson and (er) Ringo Starr were talking, in a variety of locations suggestive of massive stardom, about how changing their names from the ones they were born with had propelled their careers into the stratosphere. Yeah yeah, I thought (and will this ad ever end?). Then, at last, it came to the point. This preposterously lavish extravaganza had been put together at vast expense to tell the world that the Norwich Union was changing its name to Aviva. Is it any wonder the world of finance has fallen about our ears? These people are clearly mad.
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8 comments:

  1. Mark17 February 2009 at 11:51

    Lol, I saw a poster on the Tube the other day about the change of name and thought, sigh, they've clearly been making too much money lately, and at this of all moments. Still, maybe it will go down as a great clanger. As the Indie pointed out of another rebranding episode, 'The car manufacturer Mitsubishi fared even worse when it launched a new range branded Pajero, seemingly unaware that the word means "wanker" in Spanish.'

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  2. Brit17 February 2009 at 12:31

    Aviva, aviva! Andale andale!

    Clanger is right. Like the Post Office Consignia fiasco, totally out of sync with the zeitgeist. Going all abstrast and dotcommy just when everyone wants solid and old-fashioned stodge.

    Amazing how far con-artists can get, and the bigger the con, the easier it is.

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  3. Anonymous17 February 2009 at 14:16

    If the Dawes, Tomes, Mousely, Grubbs Fidelity Fiduciary Bank of Mary Poppins existed in real life, I wonder at what stage in the last decade they would have changed the name to fidelity?

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  4. malty17 February 2009 at 15:25

    I have told this one before but Nige won't mind.
    When the polytech's went all up market and became uni's Newcastle poly obviously wanted to morph.
    As there was already a Newcastle uni they had to spend some pondering time. City University of Newcastle on Tyne was the result, the stuff was actually at the printers when someone pointed out the error of their ways.

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  5. Nige17 February 2009 at 16:12

    The Cambridge University New Testament Society had a similar problem Malty...

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  6. Anonymous17 February 2009 at 20:55

    Metropolitan University of Newcastle on Tyne would also leave something to be desired.

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  7. Anonymous18 February 2009 at 15:52

    What did Bruce used to be called? Roger?

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  8. Anonymous18 February 2009 at 15:53

    PS: to Mark.... Surely you have heard of the fate of the "Nova" when it was marketed in Spain.

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