{"id":43,"date":"2011-02-28T06:32:00","date_gmt":"2011-02-28T06:32:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.sostevinobile.com\/?p=43"},"modified":"2011-02-28T06:32:00","modified_gmt":"2011-02-28T06:32:00","slug":"zurviving-zap","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.sostevinobile.com\/?p=43","title":{"rendered":"Zurviving ZAP"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Many of my longstanding readers know that Sostevinobile<\/font><\/b><\/font> was borne partly out of Your West Coast Oenophile<\/b>\u2019s frustration with the advertising industry in San Francisco. Meritocracy be damned\u2014this is an insidious clique hellbent on quashing true talent in favor of preserving the status quo mediocrity. A prime example of this phenomenon can be see at the once illustrious Foote, Cone & Belding, an agency that blazed trails in the 1980s with its work for Levi\u2019s, as well as its iconic claymation, The Dancing Raisins. <\/font><\/font><\/div>\n

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In the 1990s, FCB created one of the most vapid commercials ever broadcast, for the short-lived malt beverage Zima. Their spokesman, a pallid imitation of Chico Marx, feebly promoted this clear-colored alternative to Bartles & Jaymes and Quinn\u2019s Quail Coolers by eliminating the letter \u201cS\u201d from his dialogue, substituting a \u201cZ\u201d whenever possible.<\/font><\/font><\/div>\n

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Zimply ridiculouz! I was so offended by this spot\u2014not because of its content but because the hack who created it, not me, was thriving as a copywriter\u2014that I took to posting this retort outside FCB\u2019s entryway.<\/font><\/font><\/div>\n

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Zo I zaid,\u201cZit on my face!\u201d<\/i><\/font><\/font><\/div>\n

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And zhe replied, \u201cThen pop it, Pimplehead!\u201d<\/i><\/font><\/font><\/div>\n

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Zima exists now only in the painful recesses of the memory, while Foote Cone & Belding\u2019s office in San Francisco has shrunk to a vestige of what it once was. I don\u2019t pretend I could have salvaged this product, but had the FCB folks ever had the perspicacity to put me on staff, I can safely say (zafely zay?)<\/i> such a ludicrous campaign would <\/font><\/font>have<\/font><\/font> never seen the light of day.<\/font><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/div>\n

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