Advertisers can be be proud about Australia Day, but it’s a big challenge
Review Partners’ Paul Costantoura takes a look at Egard Watches’ recent Gillette ad response, and considers what it means for all brands this Australia Day.
The recent response by the Egard Watches brand to reflect on what is good about a man has drawn the usual polarising responses. However, it also has lessons for our own debate about Australia Day advertising.
As a nation Australians have always been confused about out identity and advertisers have struggled to capture it in advertising.
Go back a few decades and most Australians felt we were defined either by our British origins or by the concept of ‘a multi-cultural nation’. Telstra advertising suggested ‘True Australians’ had relatives who lived in a farmhouse with big verandas and corrugated iron roofs. Everyone else made a long distance call to the folks in the village on the hill in the old country, or perhaps to central London.
70% of Australians do not want to change the date of Australia Day.
Its the message that counts. It should be a celebration of the unification of Australia as a nation of many tribes, but if people want to put a divisive spin on it for political point scoring then its a case of “you can please some of the people some of the time but you can’t please all the people all of the time”.
I’m not convinced by the widely reported figure: i.e. 70% don’t want to change the date. I think that perhaps many believe if we change it we’ll lose a public holiday! Having said that most white Australians have very little insight into how deeply affected the celebration of Cook’s landing is for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. I’d certainly like to see that changed.
That’s odd.
I heard that 91.5% of Australians found it hard to believe that 70% of Australians do not want to change the date. About as reliable as IPA’s 71% figure. (Nah, I just made it up with a quick whip-around some non-IPA friends.)
Australia Day was only gazetted in 1994. We made a change then – we can make a change now.
You might say that is pedantry, but January 26, 1788 was the proclamation of British sovereignty over New Holland – not Australia. Matthew Flinders did use the term “Australia” during his circumnavigation of the continent in 1804 (with Bungaree at his side the entire voyage).
Australia did not officially become a nation until January 1, 1901. We made a change then – we can make a change now.
Our nation needs to look towards the future and not gaze wide-eyed to the past while not admitting all of our history.
It’s like driving a car – you have less trouble and a smoothed trip if you look through the windscreen that just look at the rear-view mirror.
As long as it is a national holiday (we Aussies love a day off) most people won’t give rats as to what the new date will be as long as it is sensitively chosen. Personal view – when the inevitable happens Queens Birthday weekend becomes Australia Day and an opportunity for a more amenable date.
When are you going back to England ?
Shut up then.
I’m not sure the Egard watch ad is that “polarising”? When I watched the video, it had 1% dislikes on youtube (288,000 likes vs 4,000 dislikes)…
And going through the youtube comments, they seem to me to be overwhelming positive?