Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Body advertising

Today's Annoyance: Tattoo overkill
Mantra of the Day: We should have seen this coming.

Imagine walking up to a sacred temple, only to see it emblazoned with the kind of obnoxious electric signage that you see outside of Las Vegas casinos. That pretty much describes what I think of body advertising. A growing phenomenon over the past decade has been the paid use of body parts to advertise for new and established brands. Toyota has paid for temporarily tattooed body parts, so has Air New Zealand, Nokia, iPhone, Blackberry, beauty retailer FeelUnique.com, Dunlop Tires and online gambling site Golden Palace, which paid a woman $10,000 to permanently tattoo their website address on her forehead. There are even websites where you can register your body parts for use, including your shaved head, your eyelids, back, arms, legs and stomach (even, and maybe especially, if you’re pregnant).

The only thing that my body will ever advertise is my fabulousness, no matter the offering price. Besides, if you think about it, I already give plenty of “body” advertising opportunities to a number of brands simply by wearing their clothes and accessories. Adorning my hand, back, forehead, or some other body part with an inked logo is just a line that I’m not willing to cross, even if it’s just temporary. Not so for everyone though. Apparently, a lot of people are leasing body parts, and so much more. I’m guessing that somebody, somewhere, has an ad on their headstone. Would you do it? What body part(s) would you lease…and for how much?

[IMAGE: Courtesy of Tatt'ad]


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