I hate everything (every little thing) about the pretentious, over-priced, self-indulging campaign for Fage yogurt. It actually makes me angry when it comes on. I may stop watching Food Network until the campaign ends. Watch it first, but be warned it may invoke unexpected anger, and then I will explain the 5 reasons I hate it.
Now, simmer down. And see if you agree with my rationale.
1. It is pronounced fa-yeh. As obnoxious as that is, fine, it’s a 50 year old brand that isn’t changing its name now. But it’s new to the US. One would think the agency and brand manager would seek a campaign that educated consumers about the brand, the name, the product. How does one know how to pronounce the name? not from the video, not from the missing URL in the video (see #2), and not from conversations they hope to have started- if there are people who like the brand (despite the campaign) and are talking about it, odds are they are pronouncing it incorrectly.
2. A classic case of creative developed by a self-proclaimed visionary stuck in an agency that wishes they were doing something else with their lives (like making movies most people won’t get). It’s 2011 and somehow a brand was convinced to spend a lot of money on a video they were told was visually stunning, broke through the clutter, elevated the brand to a premium level, made yogurt art… whatever load of bullshit they bought, the place in which the client was misled (and in my opinion the agency failed) was when they convinced the client that you don’t need to make it easy to get more information. Someone lied to the brand/client and told them that people would seek them out after such strong and compelling copy coupled with the visuals. A cow shaking its head in milk + the plain manifesto = a consumer jumping online to find out what this amazing commercial is for. The problem, you can barely read the name on the label, there is no URL, no Facebook URL, no way of even knowing that it’s yogurt. Hey, old school creatives- get over yourself, and thinking that adding Facebook, URLs and the like are beneath you. Which brings me to #3
3. It’s Greek Yogurt. Not just yogurt, not sour cream, not ice cream, not anything else that a consumer is forced into guessing. I like Greek yogurt. It is becoming a trend in the US. Why, for the love of everything holy, is Fage wasting money running :60 second spots that don’t mention it is Greek yogurt (or even a yogurt), the reasons why you should care, the benefits of it (there are health and taste benefits), the fact it was born in Athens, where to find it, that it is a 50 year old brand…or at least where you can go to get that information?
4. The copy & casting. I have written before about the importance of casting the right people, in this case it is about casting the right voice. Go to the website (I’ll give you the link, since the video and YouTube page don’t tell you how to get there – FageUSA.com – the site and the Facebook content are so stereotypically created for “the grocery shopping mom with 2.5 kids and/or the single yoga enthusiast.” The plain manifesto (as I am calling it) is read by a man with a tone that enrages me. I don’t know why, but it does. Maybe because it sounds like a Levi’s rip-off and I love that spot. And the copy is unrelatable and misguided. Hey Fage, you are yogurt. You are not changing the world., saving the children or creating a movement to make the world a happier place to live- bring it down a notch.
5. And finally, I hate this because of the :60 second spots, the over-priced video, the campaign the brand manager purchased. It makes me mad when brands spend their money in foolish ways – and furious when agencies convince them to.
Note: When I wrote this, I didn’t know what agency did this campaign, I refused to google it. But I have since googled it. It makes me even more upset. They know better and have done better. [disclaimer: i work in advertising. at an agency. not at the agency that did this campaign.]
the world according to schmogel. 
Hello Schmogel, this is my first time reading your blog, however I am in agreement with you for the most part. Most notably about the pretentious and excessively, near histrionic, dramatic nature of this commercial. I was rather astounded by the amount of praise it received by other viewers on the website “mullen”. Referring to the poetry supplemented for use in the commercial as “eloquent”, “exquisite”, and “captivating” to say the least. It seems reasonable to pose the question of if the majority have even ever read “good poetry”, as eager as they were to bestow such upon this presentation. But, I digress. I feel that the poem, if it were actually written by someone who had just consumed the product for the first time, and exclaimed “My god, that’s amazing!” it would have been more reasonable. There is romanticism in such “ideology”, for lack of a more fitting term. However, presenting their product as if this is how it were, coupled with it being in all simplicity just yogurt, is a fallacy and the root of it’s pretentious caste I believe. As if it were the Agnus Dei itself, this garish display, or perhaps debacle be it more fitting, lacks even the most basic information regarding the product, or its disintegrating integrity.
To summarize, it seems Fage is not so unlike its competitors in this market, in that it seeks to exploit weakness. How else does the beast become fed?
What makes it worse is that most of the footage could have been compiled from stock “creative” footage available in any video library. I suspect that it was.
Shut the fuck up. You just wasted my time, I was wanting to know the nutritional or none nutritional value of the product. I did not want to sit here and read about how horrible the commercial of the product was. You should put this in the title of your vent. This way you do not have people reading about unimportant information about the product. Thanks.
Look at the greek ads for this product , you can hear the name of the company so many times .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7_oA0q5mRI
OMG! Get a life….as well as getting your facts straight before writing something you know nothing about! The company is 80 years old for starters, and who cares about names. The fact is, it is the only REAL Greek yogurt in the grocery store. You get what you pay for comes to mind here! And tasting it sells itself. Word of mouth sells even more! The only thing all the other greek yogurts in stores have in common with Fage, is the words “greek yogurt” wriiten on the package, and nothing else!!!! Too bad the 80 year old company, famous for its yogurt in Greece, had to move operations out of the company to save it! I can’t count how many people I’ve turned onto Fage! Stupid commercial or not, their yogurt ROCKS!!
You might increase your credibility if you learn how to spell properly and accept the fact that Fage isn’t pronounced incorrectly. If you work in advertising, I suspect that you aren’t very good at it.