Culture Trouble
I learnt in my marketing course that a company has to be sensitive to the culture or heritage of its target market; failure to take enough precautions in this regard can often have humorous results.
Here are some real-life examples:
The Dairy Association’s great success with the “Got Milk?” campaign led to a decision to expand the promotion into Mexico. It wasn’t good news when the association found out that the Spanish translation for the tag line is “Are you lactating?”
Coors beer also decided to use an existing slogan in the Spanish marketplace. Somehow the slogan “Turn it loose” was interpreted as “Suffer from diarrhoea.”
Scandinavian vacuum cleaner manufacturer Electrolux used the following in an American campaign: “Nothing sucks like an Electrolux.”
Clairol introduced the “Mist Stick,” a curling iron, in Germany, only to find out that “mist” is slang for “manure”. Not too many people had use for a “Manure Stick.”
Pepsi’s “Come alive with the Pepsi generation” translated into “Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave” in Chinese.
When the Pope visited Miami, a T-shirt manufacturer, in an attempt to cater to the large Spanish population, printed T-shirts that promoted the visit. But, instead of “I saw the Pope” (el papa), the T-shirts displayed “I saw the potato” (la papa).