International Advertising

Cracking an international market is a goal of most growing corporations. It shouldn't be that hard, yet even the big multi-nationals run into trouble because of language and cultural differences.
Some examples:

• Scandinavian vacuum manufacturer Electrolux used the following in an American ad campaign: "Nothing sucks like an Electrolux."

• The name Coca-Cola in China was first rendered as Ke-kou-ke-la. Unfortunately, the Coke company did not discover until after thousands of signs had been printed that the phrase means "bite the wax tadpole" or "female horse stuffed with wax" depending on the dialect. Coke then researched 40,000 Chinese characters and found a close phonetic equivalent, "ko-kou-ko-le," which can be loosely translated as "happiness in the mouth."

• In Taiwan, the translation of the Pepsi slogan "Come alive with the Pepsi Generation" came out as "Pepsi will bring your ancestors back from the dead."

• Also in Chinese, the Kentucky Fried Chicken slogan "finger-lickin' good" came out as "eat your fingers off."

• The American slogan for Salem cigarettes, "Salem - Feeling Free," got translated in the Japanese market into "When smoking Salem, you feel so refreshed that your mind seems to be free and empty."

• When General Motors introduced the Chevy Nova in South America, it was apparently unaware that in Spanish, "no va" means "doesn't go." After the company figured out why it wasn't selling any cars, it renamed the car in its Spanish markets to the Caribe.

• Ford had a similar problem in Brazil when the Pinto flopped. The company found out that Pinto was Brazilian slang for "tiny male genitals". Ford workers pried all the nameplates off and substituted Corcel, which means horse.

• When Parker Pen marketed a ballpoint pen in Mexico, its ads were supposed to say "It won't leak in your pocket and embarrass you." However, the company's mistakenly thought the spanish word "embarazar" meant embarrass. Instead the ads said that "It wont leak in your pocket and impregnate you."

• An American T-shirt maker in Miami printed shirts for the spanish market which promoted the Pope's upcoming visit. Instead of the desired "I Saw the Pope" in Spanish, the shirts proclaimed "I Saw the Potato."

• Chicken-man Frank Perdue's slogan, "It takes a tough man to make a tender chicken," got terribly mangled in another Spanish translation. A photo of Perdue with one of his birds appeared on billboards all over Mexico with a caption that explained "It takes a hard man to make a aroused chicken."

• Hunt-Wesson introduced its Big John products in French Canada as Gros Jos before finding out that the phrase, in slang, means "big breasts." In this case, however, the name problem did not have a noticeable effect on sales.

• Colgate introduced a toothpaste in France called Cue, the name of a notorious porno mag.

• In Italy, a campaign for Schweppes Tonic Water translated the name into Schweppes Toilet Water.

• Japan's second-largest tourist agency was mystified when it entered English-speaking markets and began receiving requests for unusual sex tours. Upon finding out why, the owners of Kinki Nippon Tourist Company changed its name.

A math/engineering convention was held. On the train to the convention, there were a group of mathematicians and a group of engineers. Each mathematician had a ticket. The group of engineers had only ONE ticket for all of them. The mathematicians laughed at the engineers, mocking their lack of foresight.

Then, one of the engineers said "here comes the conductor" and all of the engineers went into the washroom. The mathematicians were puzzled. The conductor came aboard, and said "tickets please". He checked all the mathematicians' tickets, then proceeded to the washroom, and knocked on the door. The engineers slipped the ticket under the door.

The conductor left and the engineers came out of the bathroom a few minutes later. The mathematicians felt really stupid. On the return trip, the group of mathematicians bought one ticket for the group. They snickered at the engineers, for the whole group had no tickets at all!

Then, the engineer lookout said "Conductor coming!". All the engineers went to one bathroom. All the mathematicians went to another bathroom. Just before the conductor arrived, one of the engineers crept over to the mathematicians' washroom ... knock knock.