If you go onto http://www.ontheinternet.co.za/Household.aspx?code=MM003&Product=Magic Mop&Cat=Household, you will come across this image.
This is a current site that advertises products for sale, for delivery in South Africa. Now. In 2012.
This is not a joke. This is not an ad for a 1973 Datsun.
As a woman, I am rather concerned about who these twots are targeting, by placing a standard half naked woman strategically next to the Fantastic 360 Easy Life Mop they are trying to flog.
There are questions that need to be answered here:
1) Who is actually mopping in S.A. households – women? Or have I been misled – maybe men have taken over this traditionally female chore and you will find males in the household vigorously mopping up all over the place.
2) And by placing a sexy, cute aunty in the ad, the marketers of the mop are hoping to ‘mop’ up in this, assumingly, now male-dominated market … But, is said sexy aunty wearing the right type of bra? Should she not be in something a bit more lacy and seductive?
3) Of all the many male-moppers out there, how many are heterosexual? Excuse me for taking on a stereotypical view here (although it seems acceptable – considering the crappy content of the featured promotional material), but I can just not see all this mopping happening without limp wrists, an added shot of esteorogen and a high-pitched voice singing, “You don’t bring me flowers, anymoreee….’ So, yet again, the aunty’s placing in the ad is brought into disrepute.
4) Or, maybe, more and more domestic goddesses are turning all gay and lesbian, and this aunty is aimed at them? Hell, I barely mop enough in my house – how would I know what the lady of the house next door is up to at book club, with her mop?
5) And finally, give me a show of hands – all of you fanatical female moppers, who just had to have one of these Magic Mops, ‘cos there was a sexy aunty in a tube bra casually positioned, but not directly related, to ANYTHING in the ad!
Bet you this was yet another low-budget ad campaign, thought out by a bunch of sex-starved men, on the third floor of a Cape Town ad agency, jittery on caffiene and totally out of touch with who actually wields the mop in S.A.’s middle class suburbs.
rosfromscratch 