Totaljobs.com

‘Last Sunday, half way down Cholmondeley Road, one alarm clock was locked in conversation with another alarm clock’ narrates Children’s Hour TV man. The topic? Its new job. .A relic of the 1951 Festival of Britain, it has secured employment via TotalJobs.com which, given the fragile state of the economy and the sort of blatant ageism in the workplace that spurred on Botox-refusing dumped Countryfile presenter Miriam O’Reilly to sue the BBC, is pretty impressive, all things considered. If you too are seeking work, log on pronto. Call it an educated guess, but if this particular company is so unloved it’s reduced to hiring ancient timepieces, Human Resources will surely be keen to hear from actual humans? A lorry driving alarm clock? Gotta be some kind of a wind-up!

Lurpak

Lurpak’s handsomely shot commercial might just cause a Delia-style spike in egg sales. Contemplating a ‘post-work dinner in a box,’ Fridge Forager asks himself ‘what would the French do?’ and duly whips up a cheese omelette. All baveuse goo and wibbly, I could murder one right now. But what a vrai Français would do in this scenario is actually quite different. After his constitutional cinq-à-sept, nookie in the arms of une belle blonde, Monsieur Married would fire home for dutiful, waiting wifey’s signature blanquette de veau. After a vat of Vouvray at the nearest tabac, Monsieur single garçon would grab something (in a box) from Dallas Burger, the faux American joint that ousted Brasserie la Belle Époque on la Place de l'Eglise. And if he does conjure up an omelette from scratch, any Frenchman worth his salt prefers unsalted de Normandie, to (slightly salted) de Danemark, n'est-ce pas?

http://creativity-online.com/work/lurpak-kitchen-odyssey/22159

The Co-Op

Joe Bloggs dreads the time-consuming weekly shop at a distant superstore. Nor is he keen on that universally hated chore, chucking old sausages in the bin (you what?);  not when he could be playing hide the sausage in bed with his ‘darling wife’.  At least, that’s what I take a cameo appearance by a roaring lion to signify; although Joe might intend it as a metaphor for a family outing to the local safari park. In Co-op: The Movie 2 - a separate, equally protracted, doubly irritating monologue, scripted in the saccharine style of a ‘Love Is’ wall-hanging - gooey-wooey wifey agrees that shopping locally is the solution. Marital bliss restored! The Co-op is proud of its divi but the divvy that dreamt up this over-egged, cheesy souffle should be reduced to clear alongwith the sausages Joe just can’t resist. 

 http://tinyurl.com/26wdao8 

Terry's Chocolate Orange

For a decade, Dawn French was the enthusiastic face of Terry’s Chocolate Orange. As a brand ambassador, hers always struck me as a curious appointment. With vast swathes of the population desperately fighting the flab, where was the logic in ads whose subtext surely implied ‘dig in and you too could soon be popping into Evans Outsize in your quest to find the perfect black shroud and beaded moo moo’? A recent straw poll of Twitter foodies revealed scant appetite for Kraft’s sugary confection. Will these ‘smashing’ commercials make converts? I doubt it: so irritating is the hammering and banging within, you’d be forgiven for hurling any TCO you might have to hand straight at your TV screen. But as they appear virtually indestructible I wouldn’t go there. £499 at Curry’s is a lot to pay for a quick choccie fix.

See TV commercial here: http://tinyurl.com/2fbwdcm 

Michelin

As an L driver, I was advised never to resort to retreaded tyres. So it’s curious that Michelin Man should roll with what sounds like a retread of The Gorillaz (Michelin's UK PR was unable to say who  the actual artist is). The similarity is even more uncanny on the American version of this global commercial. Search ‘Michelin Sad Road’ on YouTube and find the UK voiceover replaced by a dude who sounds spookily like the late Dennis Hopper on the band’s Fire Coming out of the Monkey’s Head. I digress: the real story here is that fluffy potential roadkill should rejoice. Their salvation lies in a tyre that can stop in nanoseconds thanks to its grip. As for midnight stoners stumbling across this freaky animated trip, they’ll be gripped... like rabbits in oncoming headlights.

Watch it here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jct1XSUjwAM  

Jackpotjoy.com

Forgetting I’d left the TV on down the hall, when first I heard this ad’s soundtrack as noises off, I feared a kookaburra had invaded my sitting room. Closer inspection revealed the horrendous cackle as none other than that of Peggy Mitchell risen, phoenix-like, from the ashes of the burnt-out Queen Vic to be crowned the Queen of Bingo in a skit that recalls ancient variety show, The Good Old Days. It seems The People’s Pearly Queen, Babs (no relation to those stuck-up Windsors down the Mall) has hit the jackpot here. Released from her BBC contract, the ‘national treasure’ can finally afford a wig that looks, oh, about 15% real rather than those hideous acrylic haystacks the game old bird sweated under while tending to her bingo-brained brood in Walford.  

Watch it here

http://tinyurl.com/2g4nwz2 

Littlewoods

In marketing terms, Coleen is now a one word brand in her own right. Serendipitous, should she ever decide, for whatever reason, to leave her husband and kill off  the golden cow that is ‘brand Rooney’. A certain type of woman identifies with Coleen, I’m told, but since I’m  for Mars, I don’t get it. Do women buy a new frock because they like the cut of its cloth, or out of sisterly sympathy for a brand ambassador who happens to be hitched to someone who might have been outplayed by a lame donkey in South Africa but, back in England, allegedly manages to score a hat-trick, playing away from home? Baffling!  Anyway, here’s Col looking chipper enough at Littlewoods boot camp. If the woman has an ounce of sense, she’ll take Nancy Sinatra’s lyrics to heart and boot Shrek into touch. Are the peeps at Littlewoods Roo-ing the day they signed up to a media circus that would see Everton fans taunting an absent Wayne as they broke into an old Bob Marley hit, its lyrics tweaked to 'No woman, no Kai'?

Watch  Coleen here http://tinyurl.com/34rn3ku