Try My Product, It Sells Itself

My taste in commercials is a little different from most people.  I like the commercials that are brazen in their contempt of the customer. Here are a few of my favorites. If you haven’t seen one of these spots, just click on the picture and hold on to your credit card.

Head On

The laboratory analysis of Head-On posted on Wiki-pedia shows that it consists of  “iris versicolor 12× (a flower), white bryony 12× (a type of vine), and potassium dichromate 6× (a known carcinogen)”.  The x means that the number is expressed in parts per trillion. That means that Head-On is 0.0000000003% active ingredient and 99.9999999997% wax.

If you made a paste with water and aspirin then smeared it on your forehead you’d have new UltraExtraTriple Strength Head-On.

Head-On is the first Over-The-Counter Placebo. What makes it doubly effective is that the people who are most likely to be helped by it are the ones stupid enough to buy it in the first place.

What I really find cool is that the Head-On people began making fun of their own commercials.  The last edit to air carried this disclaimer:

WARNING: The following commercial contains scenes of a repetitive nature. Viewer discretion is advised”.

This is shameless. They are winking to the audience while still holding the gullible marks in thrall.

If you are a Head-On user and got a headache from reading this post, you can rub your forehead on the computer screen, rub your forehead on the computer screen, rub your forehead on the computer screen, rub your forehead on the computer screen….

Life Lock

Other than challenging every pimply hacker on the globe to try and break into President Todd Davis’ credit account, LifeLock wants to relieve you of $110 per year to tell the credit bureau to put a Fraud warning on your account and renew that request every 90 days.  You can do that yourself — and it costs nothing.

OR for $10 or so, you can make one phone call and request a “freeze”.  This means no one can do anything with your credit. That is $100 cheaper than LifeLock.

Nearly ten million people reported Identity Theft last year. That number frightened over a million people to give LifeLock money. But guess what?

Your warranty is void if you publicize your social security number.

Kids, don’t try this at home!

Video Professor

The bald guy pleads, “try my product!”

What he does not tell you is that the FREE lesson is just like the free book you’ll get from The Book of the Month Club, accept one free and he’ll send you one every month until you tell him to stop, or shout, “uncle”.

This is another product for people who don’t know much. Here it is 2009 and they still don’t know how to use a computer. From the looks of the chat boards, they also lack good listening skills.  How else can you explain all these people complaining about getting lessons they did not order at $90 a pop?

Even worse, the bald guy has them on tape agreeing to the deal!

The bald guy got so upset about people complaining at one review site that he sued the provider and wanted the list of all the complainers so he could sue them, too.  Yeah, that one was a non-starter down at the courthouse.

Next up, Video Professor offers a new course on how to order products over the phone.

ShamWow

Sham Wow has issues.

Reviews of actual buyers of the product reveal the following:

• It loses all its absorbency if it comes in contact with fabric softener. Kinda like Kryptonite
• It wasn’t all that absorbent in the first place
• Exorbitant is the price you pay for eight pieces of felt.

What is truly appalling is that a number of people admit that they received a Sham Wow as a CHRISTMAS PRESENT!!!!

My wife would divorce me. Actually, she wouldn’t divorce me, but the temperature of our sex life would have to be measured in minus degrees Kelvin.

These commercials star Vince Offer, a self-described comedian.

He released a sketch film called the “Underground Comedy Movie” in 1999 that glories in the title, “Most Offensive Movie of All Time”.  In it, you will find a beauty pageant featuring homeless bag ladies wearing bikinis. There is a sketch with a fetus salesperson. Then there is the superhero called “Dickman” who dresses in a penis costume and squirts sticky stuff on the bad guys.

This explanation sounds funnier than the movie which sits in the bottom 100 of movies of all time at the Internet Film Database.  Vince sold 100,000 DVD’s of the movie pitching it on late night TV.

Vince talks down to you. He knows this product is wonderful and you are a dummy for not believing him. He also knows you know he’s a smooth salesman, so let’s have some fun with this product.

You’re having so much fun that you do not notice the quick edits that makes spills disappear.

Did you know that he was snubbed by Flo from the Progressive Dot Com commercials? I didn’t either until I read this post by Jenn Thorson. Just scroll down when you get there – or read about the Amish infomercials they have in Pennsylvania.

The Amish do TV? Who knew?

Slap Chop

Vince financed his movie by selling vegetable choppers at swap meets. In a way, you could say that Slap Chop is the prequel to Sham Wow.

He is very loose in this spot with hilarious moves like the blatant “you’ll love my nuts” and the backward toss of the competitor’s product into the sink. That part is artfully edited.

My wife thought I had lost my mind when I started howling at the You Tube video. Who cares if the Slap Chop works or not? I just hope enough dummies “try his nuts” so that Vince can hurry on to his next commercial. The man is obviously in a hurry.

He doesn’t have all day!

Thanks to Jenn Thorson for turning me on to the Slap Chop video. That was better than a gin and tonic.

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Tagged as: Commercials, Television