The Asinine Made-Up Words Of Advertising

The Uncola was a good one. Maybe the last good one.

Last week, Axe debuted a series of :15 spots promoting their body wash products. They’re mildly amusing ads (watch them here) featuring a chatty likeable man sitting in a very sudsy bathtub.

Starting about five years ago, Axe (Lynx in the U.K.) abruptly discontinued their very successful “objectifying women” worldwide marketing strategy and began portraying their core customer as a sensitive-yet-still-mildly-masculine fella; the kind of young man who could confidently take a bath and rip muffled water farts.

Which brings us to the new campaign’s sign-off:

Created by LA’s 72 and Sunny, a good agency despite this.

Neither the bathing man nor an announcer vocalizes “#bathsculinity”. (Yes, it’s hashtagged, please go share bath selfies with your fellow semi-tough snowflakes.) Try saying it out loud a few times. Feel your mouth and your brain fighting you? That’s because it’s FUCKING IMBECILIC.

In 2013, Nestle’s low-fat dessert brand Skinny Cow (yikes, that mascot) tried to commercialize the concept of a “woman cave”. Women (and a few men, I guess) entered a sweepstakes to win $10,000 ostensibly to be used to create the ideal “lady lair”. OK, fine. Not OK or fine was Skinny Cow trying to make the word “WoCavé” (pronounced “wo-cah-vay”) happen.

Of course it’s all pink inside, like the inside of a nevermind.

From the Skinny Cow press release:

“A Wocave™… (is) where the ladies can kick up their heels with their BFFs, unwrap some ice cream sandwiches or delicious candy and dive into a few gossip magazines…”

(It’s since been discovered that “wocavé is actually an obscure Spanish word that means “mindless escapist emotionally unhealthy gorging”.)

Briefly, here are a few more of the worst “ad words” from the last 10 years or so.

Never mind what the fuck it means, It’s trademarked so if you try to use it, Svedka deathbots from 2033 will travel back in time and disintegrating you after removing your liver (if healthy).

Isn’t “Ourgasm” a better alternative? Anyway, Wegasm™ (yes, trademarked) soon made it into Urban Dictionary (probably put there by someone from Durex), with the 2nd entry reading: “An orgasm caused by a large tentacle penis during an orgy with numerous virgin sluts, typically found in hentai.”

The Chevy Equinox gets “32 MPG highway causing fuel not to be top of mind.” If you say this “word” silently in your mind three times, your brain shuts down.

Cole, the worst copywriter in advertising history (he writes his own ads), has never thought of a pun (another one here) too excruciating to put into a headline.

Office. Crush. Able. Cue up the cheesy porno music. Why not get to the point, Trident. 35% more ConferenceTableFuckAble? 35% more UnderHisDeskDickSuckAble?

At least the razor’s not pink? Agency: JWT NYC.

Before “BATHSCULINITY”, this was the worst ad word I’d ever seen. Agency: Leo Burnett, Chicago.