This week’s blog assignment was to explore an online branded community and share our opinion about it. I decided to chose the website that Professor Gallicano recommended, which was WhiteGoldisWhiteGold.com. It is an interactive website that features the mock-rocker, White Gold. With the looks of Zoolander, the hair of Spinal Tap and lyrics comparable to Tenacious D, White Gold is pure glory. I had never seen this advertisement campaign before and was eager to discover what it was all about.
If you have never heard about White Gold, it is because he doesn’t really exist. He is the star of a cross-platform advertisement campaign assembled by the same creators of “Got Milk?” Brian Braiker, a Newsweek journalist, stated that it is “an obvious bid to hit the ad-cynical teenage demographic where they’re most vulnerable: the funny bone. And the campaign is genuinely hilarious.” Now… I wouldn’t jump the ship and say that it is “genuinely hilarious,” though I could compare the style of humor to Will Ferrell’s ridiculous streak of sports movies. White Gold uses his tasteless tactics to lure the audience to his drug of choice: The White Stuff. However, unlike Rick James and Mary-Kate Olsen, this white stuff is actually milk. Through songs like “One Gallon Axe” and “Tame The White Tiger,” White Gold and his back-up singers, The Calcium Twins, sing about the many benefits of drinking milk. Stronger nails. Better Hair. Larger bones and muscles. Even better sleep! It’s all thrown at you on one computer-crashingly packed website.
Does the California Milk Processor Board really think it White Gold will be enough though? According to the Department of Agriculture, U.S. consumption of milk decreased 14% between 1981 and 2006. In California, where the campaign is primarily focused, the price of milk has climbed 44% in just five years. During a time of recession, as we are all experiencing now, it will be hard for one website to change the ways of product consumers. On the other hand, why the hell not? Milk is important, no matter what the price tag, and what better way to target an audience than to give them another way to spend time on the internet?
I thoroughly enjoyed White Gold and his website. It was a lovely way to waste an hour and have a few laughs. Although it didn’t make me immediately crave milk (as I am a college student who can’t always afford the white stuff) it did make me want to start actively drinking more in the future. My nails are feeling a little frail and my hair definitely doesn’t look as good as White Gold’s. I think that this ad campaign is an overall success, and a hilarious addition to our world’s most eager attempts to reignite consumerism.
WHITE GOLD SUCCESS
