Old Navy wants you to dress like a guy, just not this guy. In a surprising move to create ads that don’t make people want to gouge their own eyes out, the clothing retailer has opted to use cultural references to connect with audiences. Two new online spots from Camp + King for Old Navy are dripping with allusions to TV-commercial styles everyone will recognize. But an ode to the art of advertising, they are not. They are part of another sub-genre, one that parodies appalling advertising, usually for an unnamed or fictitious competing product, to position some new product or service as the hero. It's like Saturday Night Live's satirical ads being used for genuine commercial purposes. The first of the two spots is funnier. Called "Supar Tool," it's a spoof on formulaic, pretentious fashion ads. We see beautiful models in beautiful but bizarre situations, looking emotionally tortured and wearing too much makeup. In one scene, a man holds a sheep and looks forlorn. A tool no doubt. At the end, big blue badges slam on to the screen, telling the viewer, "Dress like a guy. Not that guy," and directing them to dresslikeaguy.com. The second spot, "Corporado," pokes fun at a conservatively dressed dudes. The ads—set to run on various video and men's websites, including Facebook, YouTube, College Humor, Funny or Die and Maxim—do parody terrible creative, but they seem inherently to admit that good creative gets the job done. After all, if a product can be portrayed as better because one's advertising is not as idiotic as someone else's, that implies people do flock to products whose ads are better—or at least, to products that look down on "stupid" advertising. It's not an uncommon theme, but it's executed extremely well here, with the production values alone raising it above anything cobbled together for a late-night comedy show. Check out Supar Tool here.
