Walking down the street on my lunch break, I sometimes pass a delivery man wheeling a large handcart of Japanese food. The cart bears a striking message: ‘Creating a world where everyone believes in their own authenticity.’ It raises some immediate questions: for instance, what does it mean to believe in your own authenticity? How would you go about creating a world where everyone does? And what’s it got to do with Japanese food?
It’s unfair to single out the delivery service. Today, brands big and small have a Profound Statement to make. On my way home I pass a 30ft electronic billboard which displays a young couple embracing beneath a glowing night sky. The left side is filled with a portentous message: ‘Your time in the universe is finite. Don’t waste a second. Breathe it all in.’ The logo in the bottom right corner gently hints that you can begin by taking out a phone contract with O2.
Other campaigns are less existentially fraught, more utopian: Heineken has been campaigning for ‘an open world’, where people listen to each other and realise ‘that there is more that unites us than divides us’.
It wasn’t always like this. The successful slogans of the 20th century tended to be pragmatic (‘Go to work on an egg’), catchy (‘Beanz meanz Heinz’) or flattering (‘Because you’re worth it’). Now, advertising tries to address the meaning of life.
From 1974 to 2014, Burger King used the tagline ‘Have it your way’ — a straightforward promise that you could customise your burger order. Four years ago they switched to ‘Be your way’, with a senior executive explaining that they wanted something less ‘functional’. Now Burger King was ‘trying to elevate “Have it your way” to a state that’s much more emotional and centred around self-expression’.
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