Attention, Grey Poupon Marketing Department
Yesterday, a bunch of us went out to Monk’s Pub for lunch (one of our webmasters, Shannon, was visiting and we all went out for a bite to eat).
Therewere two bottles of ketchup and mustard on the table, in those generic, single-color, plastic squeeze bottles. Matt wanted something a bit better than the standard mustard, and began to ask the waitress for Grey Poupon.
Let’s flash back a ltitle bit. In the once-popular commercial for the mustard, a well-to-do man rolls up in a limosine next to another well-to-do man sitting in his limosine. The first man rolls down his window and says in a very snobbish voice, “Excuse me, but do you have any Grey Poupon.”
Originally, the point of the commercial (and the tagline) was to indicate that the mustard was of high quality, consumed priamarily by Captains of Industry and the cultural elite. Where regular shnooks like you and me carry around sticks of Juicy Fruit in our pockets, the upper crust tote jars of fancy, Grey Poupon mustard in their limosines.
By establishing their message of high quality, Grey Poupon was able to get consumers to think of their mustard as superior to other brands. Though I don’t have the numbers to back up my theory, my guess is that they were able to charge a premium price for their product, as a result of this commercial and the subsequent associations the public had with their mustard.
Let’s jump back to the here and now. When Matt got the attention of our server, he began to ask for Grey Poupon but stumbled mid-way, unable to utter the phrase “Do you have any Grey Poupon.” In our subsequent table converastion we realized that what was originally an incredibly memorably tagline has since transformed into an actual impediment.
Because the tagline is, in effect, a request for the product… Matt found himself unable to request the product for fear of “sounding like “a snobby, pretentious dick.”
All told, the marketing folks at Grey Poupon did a good job. Hell, it’s years and years later, and I still remember both the commercial, and the tagline (as did almost everyone at the table). But I find it hysterical that what once served as a successful slogan is now working to the detriment of the very product it’s trying to champion.
I love the fact that 20 years ago, Grey Poupon did an excellent job of making it difficult to order Grey Poupon today.
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