Plenty of television commercials contain dramatizations and ridiculous situations that can't possibly be real. But when a commercial skirts the line between reality and make-believe, does it become deceptive? I think it can, especially when the protagonist is portrayed as an expert who recommends the product being peddled.
To wit: Taco Bell is running a television ad with a supposed "shrimp blogger" who discovers the chain's new shrimp taco. It's so good, he says, that he doesn't know whether to blog about it or keep it to himself. Is this obviously ridiculous? Not quite. It's entirely possible that someone in the world blogs only about shrimp. Could a post on a blog cause Taco Bell to sell out of its shrimp tacos? Well, if the mainstream media picked it up, then sure, why not?
The problem is, some consumers might actually believe that this rugged gentleman with an antipodean accent really is an expert on shrimp. He's not - he claims to have blogged about and eaten something called a "Hercules shrimp", which doesn't exist. But what consumer would have gone to the trouble to check that little factoid? If any consumers do end up believing that Taco Bell has found a real shrimp expert to recommend their product, then this is deliberate, or at least negligent, deception.
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Daniel Altman is a Harvard-trained economist who has been an economics columnist for The Economist, The New York Times and The International Herald Tribune. He is the author of three books and teaches a course on the future of the global economy at New York University's Stern School of Business.
HA! I found this post by searching for the supposed "Hercules Shrimp", as I just saw the taco bell commercial and thought something was amiss...
ReplyDeleteAfter seeing this commercial I (being a Shrimp fanatic)actually searched the web to see how I missed knowing of such a shrimp to find out that one "Hercules" shrimp doesn't exist!!! Not a fan of Taco Bell to start so this definitely won't get me running into their establishments.
ReplyDeleteexcellent post. I was thinking this when I saw the commercial, wondering if it was just an actor.
ReplyDeleteShrimpSuck.org
ReplyDeletehome of the ORIGINAL "shrimp blogger"
accept no fakes!
Taco Bell has so far not commented on these allegations. HA!!!
ReplyDeleteI don't claim to be a shrimp expert but I too found this post by searching Hercules shrimp after seeing the commercial. Do you think they used some kind of movie magic to show a giant shrimp aka prawn in the commercial? They looked really big. Also, I love how all the fishermen pull Fully COOKED shrimp out of there nets. Hahaha. Everyone knows that shrimp aren't red until cooked.
ReplyDeleteThe shrimp showed as the Hercules could very well just be a langostine. I don't think people are that stupid, that they would believe such a variety exists. Shrimp is a very common food item these days, readily found in your neighborhood supermarket. It is not an exotic seacreature that people in mainstream society know nothing about. But we all do know one thing and that is that shrimp is not cheap. So the question really is do you want to eat shrimp at taco bell for only a couple of bucks?, or are you smart enough to know that you will get the same results if you eat straight out of the garbage can! Remember the last time you had shrimp scampi or shrimp cocktail at a nice restaurant, wasn't it one of the expensive items on the menu? So how can this offer be profitable to a fast food franchise? Well, use common sense. It is certainly not premium class "A" shrimp but rather just good enough to be safe from some litigating quality concious group or is it? Remember that corruption is not a TV fantasy and that just recently we dealt with low quality dangerous automobiles that had to be recalled but not before some innocent people died first.
ReplyDeleteAmerica will believe anything specially if it sounds like they can save money. Call me crazy but I don't want my seafood out of a fast food window or handled by employees that I wound trust my garbage with. Just being realistic. You couldn't possibly think that these people are handling your food with the most strict clean guidelines!
ReplyDeleteI think that the concept of this ad being deceptive is preposterous. Taco Bell made up a fictitious shrimp in order to promote their new product. So? If someone was to actually believe a Hercules shrimp existed because of this commercial there is a larger problem at hand, they are an idiot. I've heard of people believing whatever they hear on television or the internet but Taco Bell is hardly a source for any accurate information pertaining to anything but its substandard quality meat biproducts and bastardization of mexican cuisine.
ReplyDeleteIt's just a slightly comedic commercial about a shrimp taco, nothing more nothing less.....it's not that serious............WOW
ReplyDeletei googled after the comm i feel stupid too so dont feel bad guys
ReplyDeleteum.....get a life
ReplyDeleteYeah. And there's a little man floating around in a rowboat in your toilet tank. Come ON. And you're from Harvard???? Speaking of being suspect ...
ReplyDeleteI stopped eating at Taco Hell a long time ago because of their false advertising. This is just one more nail in their coffin and I hope some legal egal finds a way to publicly discredit and sue the living shrimp out of them. I did come across an extremely large shrimp (or prawn) many years ago. We had a case of them accidentally sent to our restraunt and of course we ate all of them. I have tried feverishly to locate some for personal home cooking but you can only get the big ones by the case at well over 30 dollars a pound.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes that is why I looked for the Hercules Shrimp as well.
I think the fact that so many people went looking for the shrimp blogger proves that he has a minimal level of plausibility. And the more plausible he is, the more deceptive the commercial is.
ReplyDelete