While I'm glad they pulled the homophobic ads they had posted on the Web, and the homophobic response videos from NFL players, this statement, quoted in the New York Times hardly reeks of "I get it":
“As with all of our Snickers advertising, our goal was to capture the attention of our core Snickers consumer, primarily 18-to-24-year-old adult males,” said a spokeswoman for Masterfoods, Alice Nathanson. “Feedback from our target consumers has been positive, and many media and Web site commentators on this year’s Super Bowl lineup ranked the commercial among this year’s best.”Yeah, well, any idiot could have told them that homophobia ranks pretty high up there with some members of the 18 to 24 year old adult male crowd. So does racism, Jew-hating, and the sexual harassment of women. Is this what we can expect next from Snickers?
“We know that humor is highly subjective and we understand that some consumers have found the commercial offensive,” Ms. Nathanson said, adding: “Clearly that was not our intent. We do not plan to continue the ad on television or on our Web site.”
It still amazes me how even when there's no downside (I mean, who is Snickers worried about offending by simply saying, I'm sorry), these companies still refuse to just come clean and say 'we screwed up.'
On a brighter note, the story made the NYT, and I'll be flying to New York today to appear on Paula Zahn's show, for the entire hour, to talk about the Snickers ad and other issues of the day.
