Creative For Carpetbaggers

One ad phenomenon I always get a laugh out of is when Big Dumb Corporations and their Big Dumb Agencies introduce their product or service into a new market. They always try to link themselves to some stupid cliche about the area to demonstrate that they are "homies."

So if some company is moving into LA, they take their icon and put sunglasses on it. Or if they are going into the Pacific Northwest, they say or do something about rain.

A painful example of this is happening right now in the San Francisco area. In the financial meltdown of the past year, Chase wound up owning Washington Mutual, which was a big player in California.

For the past month or so Chase has been running an outdoor campaign that says "You'll always find our ATMs. Even in this fog."

Only one problem.

Anyone who lives in the SF bay area knows that September and October are the best months of the year here. The fog rolls in in June and stays until the end of July. It takes a well-deserved break in September and October and we get mostly glorious clear days with temperatures in the 70's.

Chase might as well be posting billboards that say, "We are overfed bozos from New York who don't know the first thing about this area and are too arrogant to bother finding out."