Last week we spent a while looking at the advertising industry - how to write adverts with various different target audiences. At the time we were considering Colgate toothpaste and our group were trying to sell it to teenagers. We came up with some ideas and went away feeling manipulated by advertising agencies.
Following lunch a few of us took our laundry in to the next village along. En-route my classmate and Ugandan friend mentioned how he always knew Coca-cola as the company that sponsored Christmas; the company that was behind Christmas. Apparently that was ‘common knowledge’ in Uganda at the time. I couldn’t help but be amused at the strength of the brand and how it had been interpreted at the time. Similarly I distinctly remember a couple of Coca-cola’s seasonal adverts as being an intrinsic part of my own Christmas memories.
Whoever said that Christmas was commercialised?