As most of you know we’ve been running a billboard design competition where you can make your own.
It has been a runaway success with over 200,000 page views and 3,000 entries. There were plenty of serious ones, people taking the piss and generally having fun with it. That is exactly what we we wanted. It was a really good exercise in building issue awareness. While the competition is over, you can still use the generator.
The winning entry has been decided by the judges (I was not one) and will go up in Wellington over the next couple of days. Its direct and to the point and will grab attention, but that’s what billboards are meant to be and selling our state assets is a serious issue that needs attention.
I like it. It says we’re not afraid to stand on the strength of our convictions.
Just hope this one won’t be obstructed by trees…
Hi !!! Good job!
Thats it?
I just love the fact that it can be read tick Bulls*t for Labour!
So Labour are saying Privatisation is not a dirty word and that Labour is Bullsh*t?
Great operation.
Off topic I know. NZ has a Debt Crisis according to the Government.
How much of that debt is down to dairy farming as opposed to Mum and Dad spendthrifts?
Mine was better, I demand a match-fixing inquiry!
Billboard …
Don
Don’t
is Bulls*it really an appropriate term to have on billboards that children can see?
It just isn’t clear enough. Sure, privatisation can mean selling assets, but it’s not the only form of privatisation. On something like a billboard you need to spell it out: “asset sales”. You don’t even say what your campaign’s about! Then there’s the further ambiguity that suggests what Labour will do is bullsh*t but still better than “privatisation”, what ever that means here. Not to mention, of course, that you’re going to lose votes by using that word. What you’re doing is here is just nuts.
“is Bulls*it really an appropriate term to have on billboards that children can see?”
I’d be more concerned that this is a message that adults will struggle to understand. It beggars belief that Labour will spend actual money to promote its stance on privatisations with this.
Oh dear. How pathetic. There were dozens that were witty, funny, clever. Is this what you think of the electorate? Is this what you want the electorate to think of you?
A disgusting and sad choice -who were the judges? It doesn’t say much about them. Sack them. They have ruined a good idea.
Face/Palm, followed by Head/Desk, followed by a stiff Scotch.
Oh dear. Oh dear oh dear oh dear.
There were some genuinely witty and powerful entries and this hollow, patronising, vulgar, insubstantial insult to the intelligence of the electorate is the one that wins? It is dumb, it’s not funny and no alternative is offered. It’s no better than the failed “Rich prick” strategy. Moreover, it comes from a party whose caucus unanimoiusly elected two Rogernomes as its leaders who were at the forefront of the asset sales programme in the 80s!
I’m not right wing, I’ll never vote National or Act, so don’t try to shoot the messenger. What this represents just fills me with despair and shows that Labour’s problem with communication is deep, reflecting a fundamental lack of substance. You can call me wrong, but the fact remains that I am Labour’s target market and it is just not selling its message to me, or even offering any indication even that it has a message. Give me a reason to vote, please! Until that happens, I remain a FORMER Labour voter.
I miss Helen and Michael. God how I miss them.
If the child is old enough to read and to ask why “Bullsh*t” is on a billboard, the child is old enough for the parent to explain the issue of privatisation and asset sales. Obviously the explanation provided to someone aged 8 would be different than that provided to someone aged 18, but nevertheless the discussion can still be had.
“Obviously the explanation provided to someone aged 8 would be different than that provided to someone aged 18″
Sadly, probably doesn’t need to be very different, if at all.
“It was a really good exercise in building issue awareness.”
Yes, but beware the law of unintended consequences. People are certainly aware of certain issues, but its more than just asset sales, however, as the general drift of comments here makes clear.
Advice: never confuse “simple” with “simplistic”.
Gris, to borrow a line from Phil Goff: “Me too!”
I love it! It’s the most unequivocal policy statement the Labour Party has released in years.
To those of you who think there were better billboards on the website I say Bullsh*t! Seriously, have you read them? @George D I think claiming there are dozens of good ones is gilding the lily more than a bit! I’ve been through maybe 200 of them and was deeply saddened by people’s inability to grasp the concept of a dichotomy, or the notion that billboards should be short and pithy rather being an entire manifesto writ large. (Although @old sammy, I do like your one a lot).
@Rhinocrates I say Bullsh*t to you too. If 20 years and a long spot in government hasn’t rehabilitated Labour on the matter of privatisation in your mind, then you’re probably not one of their target voters at all. Honestly, get over the 80s already! It looks very much to me like Labour has.
Sufi, of course there are bad suggestions, indeed most of them are bad – Sturgeon’s Law holds that ninety percent of everything is crap… but this “winner” is definitely not one of the remaining ten percent.
I have no problem with the concept of “the Labour Party”, I have a real problem with its leadership. I supported Labour in the 2000s and felt that they were competent, focussed. I had issues with their approach to civil liberties, but admired their management of government and of the economy and their essential aims and felt that more or less they had got over their 80s legacy. However, the record of the two people in the current leadership is not admirable even in the last decade, particularly Goff’s stance on civil liberties when he was in a subordinate role (consider the Zauoi case) and his attitude of Rogernomics seems to be “please forget that it ever happened or that I and King ever had anything to do with it”, which strikes me as … disingenuous. A full repudiation would be honest at least.
Moreover, Labour is not clearly articulating an alternative to asset sales. They offer a negative, but no positive. Saying “bullshit” is not a policy. What do they have to offer as an alternative? They may have ideas, but they’re not at the forefront of their campaign.
Very well, you can dismiss me as not being “no true Scotsman”, but look at the polls. Goff’s version of Labour can’t afford to dismiss ANY of its potential voters as being unworthy of its grace. It simply doesn’t have that luxury.
A well deserved win! I like this billboard, to the point on a key issue.
Looking forward to seeing the billboards around town.
Simply:
I have no reason to vote National/Act.
On the basis of this billboard, I have been given no reason to vote for Labour either.
What about the positives of keeping strategic assets, of ensuring that these things remain in the hands of New Zealanders, for New Zealanders, so that we are being fairly served, so that their primary goals are the dependable provision of essential services and not the returns to shareholders… wherever?
Is that taken for granted?
It isn’t. Those who will sell can say “efficiency” and “consumer choice” and opposition is right, but “bullshit” is not an answer.
The polls say that people like Key and he could eat babies live on national television and people would love him for it, no matter what the mess his ministers are making or how little he actually does. Personally, I can’t stand the grinning, fatuous ass, but he’s leading in the polls and “rich prick” campaigning simply hasn’t worked. It may work eventually – perhaps by 2014, but that’s too late and this billboard is only another version of that failed strategy.
I dont think this billboard makes sense, besides being unnecessarily crude.Surely the square ‘choice’ boxes beside the statements imply that there is a choice to be made.
The winning billboard does not really answer the original challenge – ie to be comparitive that is create a choice between two things -either or. This billboard just makes an opinion statement and then writes a word which may or may not describe the previous statement.
To me, and I can write it here, as we are adults and I can make my own choice to write or read things on this site,both choices mean “bullsh’t” , so are not really “choices’.
This billboard takes all the wit and useful, meaningful thought processes out of the message- not to mention interest. Just putting ‘bullsh’t’ does not a winner make, more like ‘loser’.
This is fail on so many levels. I cannot imagine what the ‘judges’ were thinking – or perhaps they weren’t!
Agree with sica. This is really poor.
Couldn’t be better. Congratulations. Say it like it is in the working person’s language – that’s nearly all of us!
@ sica
There’s a word to describe your comment – prissy.
Actually, there’s a really pertinent question to ask here: who, upon seeing this “winner”, who would not have previously voted Labour, likes the billboard and is now more likely to vote Labour?
This has nothing to do with “building issue awareness”, which is the sort of fatuous nonsense that idiots in marketing consultancies tell each other to convince themselves that, going forward, they’re pro-active dynamic thinkers, going forward. You cannot convert the choir as they already have faith, so don’t waste time preaching the same sermons to them over and over again.
Who has had their mind changed by this?
Oh, I see. Highlight supposed ‘dirty words’ and then use one. How….”giggle” kindergarten edgy is that?
Obtuse ‘dirty word’ users beware! Labour will call your obtuse ‘dirty word’ in a really mangled and removed from reality fashion and raise you ‘bullshit’. Tremble in your…your soft sole padded white socks.
really. Get. A. Grip.
Actually Rhinocrates it’s probably not that pertinent a question. The assumption underpinning your point is that the only audience is people who see the billboard, and the only purpose is to elicit the votes of those people. I’d wager that Labour are trying to generate chatter more broadly than just amongst people who drive past a billboard site or two.
I reckon a more pertinent question is: who here has had a conversation with someone about this billboard? Followed up by: in the process of that conversation, did you talk about asset sales and Labour’s opposition to them?
A Bullsh*t billboard is likely to win the election for Labour, but it’s more likely to get them in the game than some pointy-headed babble about the relative merits of “dependable provision of essential services…”. There is no point in Labour spouting off on detail while no one is listening. They’ve been doing that for quite long enough. It’s time to fight for some attention. Once they’ve got it, then they can lay it on thick and heavy with the finer points.
What’s with, in some recent posts in recent days, the asterisk sitting between ‘h’ and ‘t’?
Did those who were typing that attempting to accommodate the infamous phenomenon described by linguists as the bowel shift, erm, vowel shift? Bullshut??
But, really, what’s wrong with just openly typing bullshit?
Have we Kiwis lost our celebrated and respected ability to call a spade a spade, or call bullshit bullshit?
If you and I reckon that John Key is full of shit, just say he is full of shit.
If you and I reckon he has been bullshitting about the economy, just say.
Sufi S, you do make a good point: yes, discussion is important. Admittedly I’m not a marketing expert, so too much detail may seem “pointy-headed” and something snappier will be needed, but the sort of language that comes straight out of Foreskin’s Lament suggests zero content.
Someone who can turn a phrase to convey an impression that there is real content rather than just an attitude is needed.
As you say, Labour has been spouting detail for quite some time, but it’s all been of the “Me too” variety. I don’t think that the electorate are idiots blinded by Crosby-Textor propaganda waiting to be enlightened by party evangelists: they simply aren’t seeing any real substance or coherent policy. They need confidence that Labour offers a viable alternative with a clear, coherent policy and the competence to execute it.
A good campaign needs to not only grab attention, but to point in the direction of a coherent alternative and this doesn’t do that.
Nobody’s been listening for over two years now, and if getting attention was all that was needed to get them thinking, then commissioning billboards with “TITS!!!!” in big letters or having candidates parade down the main streets of every town dressed as poultry would have worked to raise the poll ratings and provoke discussion.
Still, like you, I do hope that once attention has been gained, presentation and discussion of detail could follow. I have your hope, but based on the evidence I’ve seen over the last couple of years, I don’t share your faith.
@Rhinocrates I loved your comment, made me laugh. It would be kind of “Labour” to do the TITS thing if we really need attention.
Hopefully what we do say will be taken notice of because it’s worthy of it.
Please have faith
As a Marketing student and prospective Marketer, in my opinion, this is a very average at best billboard. Firstly, there’s no real message behind it. For me, it looks like the message is either ‘Bullsh*t’, or that Privatisation is a dirty word. But what does that mean at all? It’s way too confusing.
Besides making a point through vulgarity, it doesn’t link in to any perceived ideas about the discourse in the election very well. A better suggestion would be ‘Let’s sell the best assets the country has got’, with ‘No’. That would make Labour’s policy stance very clear, and is still an obvious strong stand through with the ‘No’ response.
I guess what I’m trying to point out is that the message of this billboard, despite shocking, is too confusing and muddled to make any sort of impact besides creating attention. The ‘Bullsh*t’ use reminds me of the Tui billboards, which while cheeky, are designed to sell beer. Labour need to sell policies, and they haven’t made it clear enough to the average viewer of this ad what that policy is.
Fantastic choice!
A clear winner.
Perfectly put Sam.
What were the two runners up in the competition? Could someone please show us on Red Alert?
Perhaps we could vote on them rather than leaving it to the anonymous judges thus far. I imagine them coming up wih the ‘winner’ of the competition over one to many pints in the pub – no wonder it reminds Sam of the Tui advert!
I may be prissy Ann but I want Labour to win, and looking as shallow and senseless as National, not to mention as crass and crude as Kiwiblog in a poster plastered all over Wellington etc. does not give my, ‘need to respect and trust someone with good leadership and governance skills for the good of my children’ a very good feel at all.
I understand the need for ’shock’ value but at least let it make sense so that the issue can be discussed rather than a word on a poster!
And as a foot note; in my opinion (as a mother and sec. teacher) children do need to be considered – they are not considered enough these days. They do not need adult shortcomings in language foisted upon them. They are not allowed to use bad language in school and can get into serious trouble. There are enough double standards(violence, sex etc)beamed to them via TV let alone adding to it by a big red poster that is pretty senseless in more ways than one. Sorry to rain on parades but our children did not ask to be born and when they arrive they deserve the best loving, unpolluted life poss. and that includes language. Respect, not bullshit.
*This poster is for ‘grown ups only’ with the best possible axe to grind! Hoist it in night clubs and pubs.It could have real impact and gain many votes with its colourful look and message.
Obviously I feel strongly about all this, and have to record this even though this post is about to disappear.
I saw a poster up at the Basin Reserve and it wasn’t the one at the top of this post. Have the judges changed their mind?
I may be prissy Ann but I want Labour to win,.
I didn’t say you were prissy Sica. I said your comment was..
Perhaps I should have added ‘on this occasion’, but on this occasion your cognitive ability has let you down. The wording makes perfect sense, but perhaps you have to be up with modern billboard-type idiom to appreciate it. Most people will understand it in the end.
I find the first option clumsy to read.