Solet tapis, let's decorate

Solet Tapis... "carpets are the decoration of the house" with a visual of a house made of carpets. Sorry for the image does not show exactly all the ad but that's after three trials, or mostly errors to be honest. But I did think the ad was worth it to talk about. I mean Solet Tapis as customers from all walks of live, even if I presume mainly from the middle class or what is left of it in Lebanon. So the ad needed to be straightforward, and needed to hit, and needed to be placed at a time when people actually put their carpets. As the saying goes "the carpets are from independence to Martyr's day". Independence Day is just around the corner.

Elmir, and for those who don't know?

All right, all right I am the ignorant one. "For those who know" - well, I don't know. There I said it, sue me. Apparently it is a craft beer. To be fair though the ad is well done. I love the typography, as far as I know this is only placed in one place only. I love their logo as well... But I am very ambivalent about their line - I mean it puts everyone on the backpedal... What if we don't know? What if we don't care? (yes, that is worse that knowing). Maybe "for those who have standards" would have fit better as it elevates the brand as this line does without alienating the (existing or potential) audiences. 

Concord - just focus on the local

Concord, I am not even sure if this is a campaign though it is periodically present on the highway. The idea is simple - Concord is a Lebanese brand, so this is exactly what they aim for in the ad. "The pride of the Lebanese manufacturing". To be clear Concord is into white goods productions (you know stoves, washing machines, refrigerators). These are not items one replaces or buys every day. The layout is simple, the background is red (though used to be blue in previous iterations) and the product is shown. Nothing fancy, but if you want such a good, you know where to go.

McCafe goes shutterstock royalty free

All right - here's the source. And it's royalty-free. On Shutterstock.

I am not saying the ad is without merit, but well it is taken as is from somewhere else. It does say coffee love. As in literally. Not sure how this came about - did they scour the internet to look for two beans to make a heart sign once they found "coffee love" or more realistically they found the image and came up with the line? Anyhow if one did not know the origin, this would be a respectable ad.

Ksara - personalized label bottle (again)

Well, it worked for Mother's Day (here), so why not a pre-Christmas redux? Ksara is on it again - create your own label for your bottle. According to their own words: "Our bottles can now speak your language! With your own custom label design, each bottle becomes a reflection of your creativity. Place your order now on our website." So here we are again, perhaps a keepsake, or a special gift, or just a way to bottle your souvenirs (no pun!). Whatever it is, this must have worked earlier and Ksara is warming the cover again. 

Storium - Christmas already

What is there to say? Weather still mild, people still in t-shirts and despite some chilly nights in September and sporadic rain the saying "between techrin w techrin sayf tene" proved right (between October and November another summer). Which brings us to... Christmas. Storium is already on it. I can't blame them but - not even sure there is the ambient mood to go with it, because as I said, people are still wearing summer attires. Joy/Love/Christmas all this is fine and dandy but again, it all comes at such a strange time even if, calendar-wise they might be up to something.

LTV, all eyes on them.

"All Eyez on me" titled his album the late Tupac Shakur, but LTV is far - very far - from this with their "all eyes on us" which works very well for a TV station, because this is exactly what LTV is. Apparently all this is to launch their new grid with some heavy weight presenters - though the image is a bit reminiscent of "Real Housewives" season launch. The line also works as a double-entendre because "all eyes on us" means everyone is watching us. And it also implicitly means, everyone is trying to see how far we can go. Interestingly, the ads tend to cover the Kesserwan part of the highway but it stops there and does not seep to Beirut circuit.

Pasta Reggia, blink and you'll miss it.

Look - I love this ad. Is it kitsch? Yes. It is blink-and-you'll-miss it? Also yes. It is funny as hell once you see it? Incredibly so. Can you unsee it once you do? No, not at all. So what's the catch? Pasta Reggia is "Molto Rahibe" - molto is "too much" and "rahibe" is slang Arabic for "wonderful"... Whomever thought of this must be genius-level copywriting wise. Or rather "rahib/e" depending on their gender.

Toters fresh, planes, trains and automobiles (and motorcyles)

So here we are - Toters Fresh has a new promise: "we're coming on motorcycle to make you win a car" with - obviously the car strapped on the motorcycle for good measure. Well, the other day I saw a Syrian man who strapped a full washing machine on his motorcycle (yes, my jaw dropped) so who knows a car is not that far fetch (that Syrian man defied the laws of physics so one of those Toters motorcycle drivers could pull the same trick). The line is funnier that the visual though. But the whole ad is cheeky.

Wolfofbey - filed in triplicates

Wolfofbey has new workshop - the training is for free and the whole thing is to "Start your online business". All of this is fine and dandy, the ads flooded the streets so heavily that in Dora there were three of them at literally three adjacent buildings. Which, honestly, is a bit too much. Now I am all for entrepreurship and all (apparently working 9 to 5 is too old hat!) but please people, seeing the same ad everywhere in town is really, a lot to take. 

Cosmaline, or how to stand out

Is this ad creative? No. Is this ad conceptually interesting? Also no. Is this ad exceptionally art directed? Triple no. What this ad does though is make you look, which in today's world is a rarity. As I said, nothing in the ad is exceptional, but it does what it is devised to do. Stand out, portray the product, and eventually make you buy it. Considering Cosmaline is a Lebanese company, this might attract a lot of people since brand loyalty got thrown from the window since the financial crisis started in 2019 and everyone started counting their pennies.  So here's a thought, sometimes you need to go back and trade pseudo-creativity for something that actually sells. Cosmaline just did that.

Cafe Super Brasil - go back to the basics

Well, here's a very basic ad. So basic it actually makes you look. As I said prior so many times, comparative ads are banned in Lebanon, so the slogans need to be "vague" such as the one above "the tastiest coffee" - because "tastiest" as compared to some non-entity without having to support it statistically. So voila, here's the slogan, here's the packshot, here's a red background, thank you very much. Honestly, in a sea of more of less mediocre ads, this one makes sense.

Tannourine fights back with an orphan unipole

I stand corrected but this unipole is an orphan one. OK, I guess I am the only Lebanese who has not spoken about Tannourine and their predicament. To recap, Tannourine found itself in hot water (no pun!) - with reports claiming their bottled water was contaminated. What happened later was stuff of legend, and included one of the worst crisis management cases. Well at this point it turns out that no, their products were not contaminated, even if the Ministry of Agriculture had issued a decree to recall them from the market, so it all ended up a case of misunderstanding - or so it seems. Long story short, Tannourine, instead of going all out with a major campaign exonerating themselves has gone with this lone one. That's it, nothing else! "More pure than talk" - great line considering the circumstances but honestly someone should tell them what crisis management is.

Sagesse - what on earth is this?

To be clear I am a proud of alumnus of Sagesse/Hekme Achrafieh school. Also to be clear - what on earth is this?

"You and your heart say Hekme, you and your parents say Hekme, we are now close to you wherever you are" then there is a logo with "basketball and football", a phone number, and also the listing of all the places the club now is on the Lebanese territory. 

All in all, a disaster. Too many words, too little design, no one would even read this going on the highway because it is studded with information and barely attracts any attention. Which is a pity because as I said I would have loved for this to work. But honestly, and quite fairly, it does not.

Sandwich W Noss - great artists steal

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Ah Sandwich W Noss has a nice ad! "We stole the idea of the shaker and make it tastier" - cheeky one indeed. But it works superbly. Mostly because obviously, the wink they included. Now, I do hope that they will make it of a decent size because their sandwiches were a bit minuscule yet priced the way other places would be more generous in terms of content. But this aside as Picasso said "Good artists borrow, great artists steal" - so, apart from the Louvre, this one was a good theft.

Kassatly Chtaura - the line that won't die

Kassatly Chtaura is having an ad moment. This means that Christmas is approaching because of the liqueur element. Interestingly the ad is about their new look for the bottles (the old ones were the classic large from below and with a long funnel on top, to be honest, like Bols bottles!). Yet the ad, thankfully, goes back to a classic (one that never dies). First, (re)watch the classic ad here. It dates back to 1986 and it has not lost one ounce of its Chutzpah! And the line? The one that never dies: Liqueur moi!

Gandour Cream Cookies - a cute one indeed

Gandour Cream Cookies has blessed us with a cute one. It simple goes "they're sweet inside out" but the word sweet in Arabic is the same as "beautiful". So yeah a bit of double-entendre that actually works considering Gandour could have pasted this without any line and still got people's attention. Do note that Gandour like all other companies have gone through the loss of brand loyalty since the financial crash, also they dabbled with shrinkflation (here) but Gandour is such an old Lebanese institution (the word applies well to them) and I guess they will survive the crisis after all.

Almaza is on to something with its unfiltered

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Almaza is on to something here with its unfiltered ad. "Everyone is buying gold" a wink at the price of gold that everyone has been talking about as of late. Considering they just had a hit (here) the above is another good ad even if, honestly, I don't understand why they're not talking in Arabic. Almaza is playing between languages and not really making strategic sense. I mean as I said, the ad is interesting, and yes it hits on the Almaza forte of talking about current events with a wink, but had this been in Arabic it would have been a smash.

Cancer detection, LAU opts for an awkward angle.

I am all for good causes. This one leaves me a little confused. But perhaps maybe I am not the target audience hence me not being sensitive to a certain angle here. "Dare to do an early (breast) scan, dare to believe in your femininity, breast cancer". I am not sure why this angle specifically was chosen. But once more, I am not the target so perhaps I have no idea how women think about breast scan, and how much this makes them feel un-feminine. If this is the case, good on them. Because then it would make sense to the women not wanting (or daring) to do the scan. Otherwise, I found it strange.

Association of Lebanese Industrialists - or how to do a wonderful ad

And to those trying to come up with good ads while being "creative" and dabbling for heaven knows what please let me introduce you to this ad by the Association of Lebanese Industrialists. All you have to do is - almost - nothing yet actually it is a lot. "Meet us at the expo of made from the heart of Lebanon". Thank you, everyone can go home now. Not just "made in Lebanon" but made "from the heart of". OK, maybe the heart emoji thingy was a bit too much, but am ready to skip talking about it because of this incredible ad.