Break out the Astroglide and snap on the furry handcuffs, Singapore’s bringin’ sexy back. And it’s been gone a long while, let me tell you.
But here’s a head-scratcher for you. We’ve got dueling condom billboards, admittedly making no claims to actually being a product used by humans but lots of fun if you’re into naughty balloon animals or you’re a banana, so why aren’t we mentioning why this product is important?
It’s not a giant leap from advertising a condom to actually saying that it helps to keep you safe from HIV infection, and seeing as our government refuses to do any HIV prevention advertising (see these enlightened statements from 2004 and these from 2005 for the reasons), it would be an amazingly fantastic community service from Durex and Okamoto if they took on a bit of corporate responsibility and helped out. As far as I can see there’s absolutely nothing stopping them putting an HIV prevention message on their ads.
Durex? Okamoto? Are you listening?
Great that you can afford Ogilvy’s fees and the costs of the media, because our local prevention advocates can’t, so how about doing something good with your money, and advertise your product, and win more love from us? Everyone wins.
2 Comments
October 22, 2007 at 4:46 pm
Great post and I’m in total agreement with you Marc.
Come on Durex and Okamoto – you can create a cool and educational message and still sell how many millions of condoms.
How about really pushing the boat out and partnering with some of the local prevention advocates and sponsoring a campaign.
Win Win is possible and if the government is too conservative (head in sand) then show some leadership. You know you can do it.
Liz
July 3, 2008 at 6:12 pm
[...] are back in the news again. I was writing about the Durex balloon-figure campaign in Singapore late last year, and it seems a delayed public-complaint has set the Advertising Standards Authority of Singapore [...]