Top 10 Most
Brilliant Marketing Screw Ups
1. Coors put its slogan, "Turn
it loose," into Spanish, where it
was read as "Suffer from diarrhea."
most
beer does that to me anyways lol
2. Scandinavian vacuum manufacturer
Electrolux used the following
in an American campaign: "Nothing
sucks like an Electrolux."
3. Clairol introduced the "Mist
Stick", a curling iron, into
German only to find out that "mist"
is slang for manure. Not too
many people had use for the "manure
stick."
4. When Gerber started selling
baby food in Africa, they used the
same packaging as in the U.S.,
with the beautiful Caucasian baby
on the label. Later they learned
that in Africa, companies
routinely put pictures on the
label of what's inside, since most
people can't read.
Can
You Just Imagine That ?
5. Colgate introduced a toothpaste
in France called Cue, the name
of a notorious porno magazine.
6. An American T-shirt maker in
Miami printed shirts for the
Spanish market which promoted
the Pope's visit. Instead of "I saw
the Pope" (el Papa), the shirts
read "I saw the potato" (la
papa).
7. Pepsi's "Come alive with the
Pepsi Generation" translated into
"Pepsi brings your ancestors back
from the grave", in Chinese.
8. Frank Perdue's chicken slogan,
"it takes a strong man to make
a tender chicken" was translated
into Spanish as "it takes an
aroused man to make a chicken
affectionate."
9. The Coca-Cola name in China
was first read as "Ke-kou-ke-la",
meaning "Bite the wax tadpole"
or "female horse stuffed with
wax," depending on the dialect.
Coke then researched 40,000
characters to find a phonetic
equivalent "ko-kou-ko-le",
translating into "happiness in
the mouth."
10. When Parker Pen marketed a
ball-point pen in Mexico, its ads
were supposed to have read, "it
won't leak in your pocket and
embarrass you". Instead, the company
thought that the word
"embarazar" (to impregnate) meant
to embarrass, so the ad read:
"It won't leak in your pocket
and make you pregnant."
Thanks my friend for sharing this list !
vaccum graphic here