Ass Backwards

Reebok’s first major ad campaign in two years is groundbreaking. It is the only instance in recent memory where a company has so thoroughly failed at selling sex to their target demographic. The magnificent failure in question is for Reebok’s “revolutionary” new shoe, the EasyTone. The idea of the EasyTone is that merely by walking, I can work my calves and hamstrings up to 11% harder (!) and tone my butt up to 28% more than if I were to walk in my common, inferior shoes (!!!). Yeah, I know, who gives a fuck? The commercial features a beautiful woman with legs that are already long and toned and with an ass that would make an atheist reconsider god. The problem is that it also features a sex offender behind the camera and he zooms in on her ass every time she mentions it—which, considering the product, is often. Is she offended when he does this? Does she mace the pervert? No. She coughs politely and motions for the camera to film her face, saying, when the camera begrudgingly moves away from her ass, “I take it you agree?”

There are a couple fundamental problems with this method of trying to sell a product. First of all, treating your target demographic (women) as pieces of meat, whose sole purpose of living is to look beautiful and be stared at by unsavory men with perspiring upper lips, is just bad marketing.

Secondly, knowing who you’re marketing to is probably going to be a big help in moving forward. I was watching this commercial with a female friend and she went from complacent to righteously furious in the span of the thirty second commercial while I went from mildly aroused to…mildly aroused. I’m not a business major or anything, but I think if you make a product for a woman and in attempting to market it to a woman, the woman begins to foam at the mouth, her eyes burning like the lidless eye of Sauron, her body paralyzed with rage, you’ve failed.

The EasyTone commercial seems like it is marketing to men, but logic would dictate that if you buy a shoe that will help tone your girlfriend’s/wife’s/fiance’s calves and ass, you’re just begging to be dumped/dirvoced/a combination of dumped and divorced. It would be akin to saying, “Yes, those pants do make your ass look flat, but I bought you some shoes that can remedy with that.”

However, there is a silver lining. If you failed Marketing 101, Reebok will still hire you.