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Media Week: Fresh marketing trouble

Apr 17, 2015, updated Nov 20, 2015

Today, marketing problems for Woolies and The Stag, a rare media job opening, beautiful books and more.

Fresh marketing trouble

An almost unseemly joy seems to emerge when a big company has a marketing failure.

And there are few bigger Australian companies than Woolworths, and few bigger marketing stuff-ups than Woolies’ Anzac-themed “fresh in our memories” campaign that was launched this week and crashed under the weight of outrage within a few hours.

As this column pointed out last week, many companies are seeking to cash in on the centenary of Anzac Day. However, the Woolworths campaign was spectacularly tin-eared (the “Fresh” tagline conjured horrible images in the context of Australia’s fallen young men).

No doubt Woolworths’ marketing people are quickly reviewing the marketing “activation” planned for “Camp Gallipoli” events which are coming up across Australia including at Adelaide’s Morphettville Racecourse.

Who knows what the fresh food people have in mind for the Camp Gallipoli Anzac Disneyland extravaganza?

Meanwhile, you can get your Camp Gallipoli merchandise, including a fetching hoodie (available in a crimson shade called “rhubarb”), from Target stores.

UPDATE: Reports just in say Target has been ordered to withdraw from sale several Camp Gallipolli items.

Not a meat market

The Stag closed its doors this week, causing many to scratch their heads about how a pub in such a brilliant position – on the corner of East Tce and Rundle St – could run into trouble.

The hotels association’s Ian Horne seemed to blame pop-ups – but The Stag’s marketing approach no doubt played a part.

Consider this: The Stag sits diagonally opposite the Garden of Unearthly Delights, which attracts thousands of people every day throughout Mad March. Presumably, a large proportion of these people wouldn’t be in The Stag’s corner of the city without the attraction of the Garden.

The Garden attracts a mixed demographic, but not – in all likelihood – an old-fashioned steak and chips crowd. For years, The Stag has been selling itself as “the worst vegetarian restaurant” in Adelaide. At least it was a point of difference, but probably not an ideal one, particularly during Fringe.

Meanwhile, other local restaurants have opened offering something more grown-up and sophisticated – think East End Cellars, Mother Vine, Street and Orana, just to name a few.

Rare opening

SBS is advertising for a video journalist in South Australia.

The long-term incumbent, Karen Ashford, has moved to Flinders University to head up its communications unit.

She tweeted that this was the first time in 21 years that the job has been vacant.

See the job specs here.

Judge away

You might not be able to judge a book by its cover  but that doesn’t stop us judging covers in their own right.

Books by several South Australian authors are among the finalists in this year’s Australian Book Design Awards, run by the Australian Book Designers Association.

Prolific fiction writer Sean Williams’ “Twinmaker” series is up for a gong for best designed children’s/young adult series. The series was designed by Astred Hicks.

Food writer Dee Nolan’s beautiful tome, A Food Lover’s Pilgrimage to France, designed by Allie Webb, is shortlisted for best  designed fully illustrated book over $50.

In the primary/secondary education category, Always True: Wilderness School, by Jane Danvers and others connected with the Medindie school, is shortlisted for its design by Nathan Fuller and Adam Carpenter.

Dee Nolan cover resized

Anne Summers event

Women in Media South Australia is hosting an evening with writer Anne Summers.

The event will be held at the Lyceum Club in Leigh Street on May 4 and will feature an armchair interview with Summers conducted by Collette Snowden.

Bookings and details here.

Women in Media launched in SA in February. The mentoring and networking initiative of the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance is open to women working in all areas of the media, from journalism to PR and corporate affairs.

Adelaide cliche watch

Regular readers will know that Media Week keeps a close watch on the Adelaide jokes favoured by Australian Financial Review columnist Joe Aston.

They’re usually about serial killers. Which makes a change from the “Adelaide is boring” thing.

This week, he reported on his trip to the Port Adelaide versus Sydney game at Adelaide Oval: “Adelaide was the place to be on Saturday – and not just for homicidal types looking for easy victims.”

Among a flurry of name-dropping, he reported that Port fan Amanda Vanstone was “absolutely livid about a questionable field referee call”.

Field referee? You’re not at the rugger sunshine.

Naughty corner

It looks like the struggling Fairfax media empire has made a monumental misjudgement with its precious archive of news photographs.

As reported by the NZ Herald, the company shipped up to eight million historic New Zealand news photographs and negatives to Little Rock, Arkansas, for “digitising” by the Rogers Photo Archive (RPA). The deal also included photographic records from the Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and other Australian publications.

According to this report, two years on the digital archiving remains incomplete, some photos have turned up on eBay for sale and the company involved is in receivership and faces 10 lawsuits worth more than $94 million. Fairfax has gone to court to recover the photos.

It’s a reminder that media companies, particularly as old as Fairfax, are repositories of our history and they have a responsibility to the community to keep these records safe.

Top of the class

The local media is starting to realise that the new captain of the Adelaide Football Club, Taylor Walker, isn’t your average cliche-bound footballer. He’s far from garrulous, but The Age’s Samantha Lane managed to elicit plenty of new detail about Walker in this interview. Fascinating.

Media Week is published on Fridays.

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