Monday, December 14, 2015

I don't think Don Draper came up with this one

I was listening to the Thom Hartmann radio show as I was coming home from running a few errands earlier today and heard one of the oddest ads that's slithered past my ear drums in a long time. It was a pitch for life insurance.

The target audience was supposedly older men. It said, in essence, hey, dude, look at you with your three ex-wives and now Trophy Wife Number 4 is getting on your case about life insurance. She says you need more. So have we got a deal for you -- we can help you afford that million dollar policy she'd like your ass covered for. What the. . . ? What brilliant marketing genius came up with this one?

Maybe it's just me, but if I were a 60-something dude with a hot young babe of a trophy wife and that hot young wife was nagging me about upping my life insurance coverage, I'd get a tad nervous. I wouldn't be thinking, yes, I must make sure she's well compensated if I happen to take a dirt nap. Au contraire, I'd start wondering if she had something going on with the pool boy and taking a closer look at salads containing fresh mushrooms.

Besides, by the time you get to Wife Number 4 if you've got any money at all (and surely you do have money if you're a geezer but have a Trophy Wife) you're familiar with the magic words "prenuptial agreement." You've looked at the statistics; you know that much younger wife is likely going to outlive you, so why on earth would you worry about whether or not she's going to get a million dollar payout when you croak?

All in all, a very strange ad -- and more proof that people working in advertising don't live on the same planet as the rest of us.

4 comments:

  1. My wife is older than me. Should I ask her to fork out for a bigger life insurance policy? I'm pretty sure she just keeps me around for brawn and eye candy. Sounds like a Dear Abby kind of question, doesn't it?

    ReplyDelete
  2. ANY time a wife starts asking for a $million life insurance policy, I'd be asking myself what is that about. Unless you have children ready to go to college and that is the only way you can afford it.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Older guys with a string of divorces and a hot trophy wife? That's a pretty narrow target market. You're basically selling to Trump.

    ReplyDelete

My space, my rules: play nice and keep it on topic.