Interchangeable Words

Sorry for the radio silence. A good friend is getting married in Florida next weekend and I have been busy with work and planning a bachelor party this weekend. I probably would not have written until next week, but I heard something on the radio that irked me.

If you know me, you will know I am a connoisseur of both advertising and pizza. The subject of my ire was a radio ad for Papa John’s, so it combined these two things I love. The ad in question was for Papa John’s new garlic breadsticks – which it advertised as “tearable and sharable”.

Keep in mind this is a radio ad, so it is not quite as easy for the ear to distinguish the difference between, for instance, “tearable” and “terrible”. When I heard the ad, it took a moment to figure out why Papa Johns would be advertising bread sticks as simultaneously atrocious and yet, something you should pass on to friends.

I had this vision in my head of the guy who takes a sip of a long stale beverage then turns to his friend to say, “Does this taste bad to you? To me, it is both terrible and sharable.”

I can’t imagine Papa Johns will run this ad for long. It can’t be easy to justify spending large dollars on an ad buy to tell people your product is terrible.

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