Freedom Furniture: ‘Mum reckons he’s gay’
An ad for Freedom Furniture which breaks on Tuesday is set to take the brand into new territory – that of sexuality and stereotypes.
The TVC from M&C Saatchi – which the agency says has been designed “to get people talking” – features a little girl chatting to her grandmother about her father’s creative flair.
The grandmother tells the girl: “He was always very good at art”
The girl reveals: “Mum reckons he’s gay.”
Love the work – they should be proud, this is the most creative stuff I’ve seen out of M&C Sydney in ages (and, no, Herringbone doesn’t count)
Perhaps they should have combined these concepts to feature a gay man who’s so comfortable lounging on the fruits of his creative labour he can’t be bothered to chase the mouse. After all, not only are the gays skilled in the art of interior decor, they also make excellent pets.
Advertising ‘products that can stand the test of time’ by dusting off stereotypes that won’t die – circularity worthy of Ouroborus…
There is nothing clever about the first ad, they’re clearly just after attention. If like me you have the ads on mute, then it’s not really money well spent. The second ad, I kind of smirked.
There is no impression left of the company, there is no strong value proposition. Very easy to ignore.
I would suggest that the first ad is somewhat gratuitous in its use of the stereotype.
Not as insightful as the original European IKEA ads and their nod to their “creative consumers”. I suspect it could get the wrong type of attention.
The second ad I really like. It communicates the proposition in an interesting, relevant and motivating way. I’m just not sure if there is supposed to be any campaign connection to the first?
I saw the second ad, but like Jordan, it was muted.
The cat did get my attention and I glanced over and smiled, said to myself how cute and then turned away again.
I thought it was an ad for cat food – “cat so satisfied with meal, it doesn’t want mouse”.
The mum sounds like a bogan… so… they’ve successfully reached their demographic.
First ad “meh”, second ad, well done!
The first ad is a blatant attempt at using a stereotype to get attention. It does nothing to highlight the fact that you can now choose to mix and max finishes with your furniture. Viewers will forget this and just focus on the little girl saying her dad is gay.
And without wanting to take this too seriously, I cant see how this ad will help the cause of gay acceptance. You would think the little girl would have just suggested her dad had aids by the look on the grandma’s face.
The second ad would have worked better in a 15sec version.
Gay ad: A shining example of agency creative that is completely out of touch with its target audience. I assume Freedom doesn’t want the pink dollar anymore with this tired old attempt at humour at the expense of the gay community? Both M&C and Freedom should rethink this approach. No matter how people try to sugar coat it, gay is still a minority group – you wouldn’t trivilaise fat, indigenous or coloured people…so why should gay folk put up with this crap? I can’t even get married to my partner, so don’t object to being used as vehicle for marketing.
Cat ad: loved it – makes sense and is cleverly executed. However, as it’s been created by the same blockheads that made the ‘Gay’ ad, its in the bin for me.
First advert is definately a Meh.. the first commenter sounds like a paid representative of M&C. “most creative work”..”should be proud” my god, are we watching the same advertising?
The second advert is entertaing but is not remotely connected to the first, so no flow-on effect, and is really nothing new. The new ikea adverfts (the “start the car..woohooo ad) have so much more impact.
Furniture advertising is difficult to do on mass media, I feel. The majority of their purchase behaviour is offer based- none of them really seem to stand out from the pack..
Suuuuuuper
The ‘GAY’ ad is great.
The second ad is SH*T.
Both ads are crap and wtf is up with the daggy couch in the second one.
Cute, but are both more AWARD school student than well known ad agency to me.
Dear god, please make sure the Cat ad is not on the kind of ridiculously high rotation most stuff gets these days. Once is enough. Less would be better.
The ‘gay’ dad ad does not sell the furniture. It sells ‘Here at freedom furniture we will discriminate’
What century is this? Why is this getting so much attention and what’s the big deal?
Ooh shock horror someone said the word “gay” on TV!
To quote Harry Potter:
“Fear of a name only increases fear of the thing itself.”
But I suppose now I’ll be accused of advocating witch craft or some such nonsense.
As an employee of Freedom Furniture, i was utterly amazed at how many times a day people have asked me questions relating too our advertising
It has defiantly worked in getting people talking so big congrats too M&C
As too the effectiveness of them i believe the “gay” add was highly unnecessary in portraying its message but the cat add was purely genius