Cafe Super Brazil and fortunetelling
Cafe Super Brazil and storytelling
By Admin R : When it comes to coffee, I’ve always thought: How do advertising agencies seduce consumers with an unconventional ad? It’s indeed a hard task for creatives to move from traditional approaches for such a traditional product; So after brainstorming comes the light bulb moment: A fortuneteller and a cup of coffee: It’s fun, real, mysterious and highly relates to our culture! hurray let’s shoot it.
The idea is not bad until you hear the “clairvoyant” speaks. She’s classy, blonde, English Educated with a light French accent, and has a 5 stars workplace – lucky her!
Isn’t coffee a popular product targeting all social classes? After all, “Cafe Super Brazil” is not “Lavazza”, and its target audience is not usually an elite class of people.
Another note: The TVC portrays women drinking “Cafe Super Brazil” and waiting for the fortune teller, which makes “her” the central unit of this whole approach, as if those women only drank the coffee to use it for fortunetelling disregarding its good rich taste… No flavor nor quality is a USP here, but stories “khabbriyeh-As said in the headline”, which makes it personal and lovely, but what about the coffee?!.
Does this approach sound “real” to you?!
Here’s what a faithful reader thought of this ad in an email asking for our opinion, adding a well spot point that makes this campaign highly questionable:
Guest J : “I don’t know if you guys agree, but I have mixed feelings about this campaign. My first impression was that it’s nice and very well done.
But the more I see it, the more I say: REALLY?! Do we really need to keep stereotyping Lebanese women as the ones who keep waiting for fortune tellers’ opinion, specifically about men?
As a girl, I refuse to be seen that way, I am sure this goes for most working ladies, who work their ass off during the day and might not even have time to drink coffee, more specifically no time for “tobb el fenjen” and wait in the queue for Mrs. Whatever fortune teller”I’d rather watch ABOU-NAZIH commenting on the political circus in the Lebanese parliament.
(Video will be added when officially published online)
Ana baddeh koun sitt beit bass ekbar
hahaha!! Good for you Miss Ambitious!
I thought it’s fun and cute. The woman is very well chosen.. charismatic and with a funny character. Don’t go to the issue of stereotype and make it as if they are generalizing and go much into the social class details. I think these reflect too much digging from your side to an extent of kinda diverging from the main point. If we were to dissect this much each and every ad really.. things won’t end. And it’s not nice to seem as if one is reallllllllllly searching for sthg to bring on.
the ad is fun and cute..again.. these women and this habit of ‘bossara’ exist in a little fragment and they are not offending anyone. The ad just makes you laugh and this means it touches you. so to me.. it wins.
Worth mentioning that Super Brazil is in the maturity stage. No need to emphasis on quality and taste it’s very old in the market I think and even people who don’t drink Turkish coffee are familiar with the name and the packaging and yes even rich people could seek this product coz simply people who love Turkish coffee find it with a really rich taste. Isn’t Lavazza for Espresso anyway? Super Brazil people just needed a reminder out there… in the competition. and that was a tender one.
cheers guys
I personally agree with you T, especially on the “maturity level” part.. But honestly the ad did not make me laugh, I was more like “whatever is happening in this ad, it’s not even close to real fortunetelling experiences.. Why faking it!?”
)
Anyhow, the post remains Admin R’s point of view, and I think having diverse opinions is a very enriching trait of the blog.
Well we all agree that cafe brazil has been in the market for so long and they definitely reached maturity stage. Agreed that they don’t really need to keep reminding us about the good taste (however, I think we all agree that taste is the only attribute for coffee, not color, no size, not the packaging just the taste).
And we all agree that the whole “bessara” concept is something cultural and goes way back in history. But seriously, she didn’t need to be that filthy fortune teller and all she does is talk to girls about their ‘potential’ future husbands (the one that really hits on my never is when she compares the 2 guys)
If it was a gypsy kind of clairvoyant with a funny arabic accent and reading for different kind of age/gender audience on raouche or in ahwet layla, it would have been a success I’m sure. At least this is what I think
sorry to say that this is among the most boring ads I have seen on TV… no fun and no laughs.
I can’t find the video online. Does anyone have a link to it?
Thanks!!
The video is not available online.. we’re still searching to embed it to the post
Karine, the video is not available and embedded with the post
after checking the vid i can tell you i really like this ad, it shows that superstition is stll alive even in the 21st century and in non expected places, which is very true so…bravo, well done!
with reference to this comment “as if those women only drank the coffee to use it for fortunetelling disregarding its good rich taste”; not every ad campaign needs to tap on the functional benefit of the product. in some cases, the beauty of a campaign lies in the story it tells, or the promise it delivers on a brand level versus on a product level.
it’s actually refreshing to find a client doesn’t insist on going functional!
as for this one “Do we really need to keep stereotyping Lebanese women as the ones who keep waiting for fortune tellers’ opinion, specifically about men?” – that is called insight!
Glad we’re having this sort of discussion. Initiating debate over such issues generates awareness.. Thank you Lara