"Achilles or Hector?" ... Would this make a good Under Armour advertisement?

Spec-Ad

People Hate Advertising

Oh, I know, people hate advertising. 

But here's the thing ... they don't. They hate MOST advertising. 

Every once in a while, one comes across a commercial and thinks, "Wow, that's beautiful!" So why don't more advertisers attempt to make beautiful ads? It's for the same reason that more Steemians don't try to make beautiful posts ... it's hard. And, contrary to popular opinion, and  megalomaniacal  industry self-promotion, most advertising people are not very creative. 1% are original, the other 99% copy-pastes.

"Our creatives creatively created the creative." Sounds like over-compensation ... and it's not very creative.

My company, QuillFire Creative, takes a different approach. No lying, cheating or stealing. Rather, we try to poetically elevate an idea, ideal or insight that human beings universally admire. The above poem is a Spec Ad, meaning that Under Armour hasn't endorsed it. But should they?

Dwayne Johnson is one of the highest paid actors in Hollywood. He's also one of Under Armour's most prominent spokesmen. Indeed, he has his own dedicated UA line of sportswear called, Project Rock. He has 12.9 million Twitter Followers and a similarly ridiculous number of followers on Facebook, Instagram and other social media platforms. That's a lot of reach. Moreover, The Rock is widely popular with his fans because he's a "regular guy" who started with nothing and "worked harder than anyone else in the room."  

So, you have him sit in front of a camera and recite the poem. This is not "Jack and Jill Went Up The Hill" ... it is a poem that has gravitas. Throw in some poignant background music. Add some video of Stephen Curry, Tom Brady and Jordan Spieth - super-star athletes notorious for being "good guys" and "team players." Now throw it up on YouTube. Promote it on UA's social media sites and those of its celebrity athletes. How many hits do you think it would get?

Poetry is about metaphor. Metaphor works because people extract meaning from words, both the literal and the figurative. The poem isn't about shoes or shorts or shirts. It's about something far more potent: ethos ... and ethos defines you far more than does a pair of sneakers. The poem is about what we, as a society, and Under Armour as a company, choose to elevate: The Great Men or The Good Ones. 

It doesn't have to be either/or ... but it often is. Often, "winning at any cost," means abdicating responsibility towards one's family, colleagues and society-at-large. It's a selfish and self-centered ideology, and it's unnecessary, as demonstrated by the conduct of the world-class athletes mentioned above.     

And, the irony is that it would be cheap ... but a fraction of the cost of making and running a single television commercial. Of course, I think this would make a pretty good Super Bowl commercial, in which case you can strike "cheap."

Kevin Plank

Under Armour's founder is a serial entrepreneur named Kevin Plank. Besides being the CEO and Chairman of Under Armour, he also privately owns a number of companies including Sagamore Farms (horse racing), The Baltimore Pendry Hotel (extremely swanky) and Sagamore Whisky. Moreover, he's on a one-man mission to resurrect one of America's most troubled cities, the City of Baltimore. 

This latter goal is, quite frankly, insane. 

Why should a billionaire waste untold millions trying to rehabilitate a city where one-in-ten of its inhabitants is addicted to heroin? For God's sake, move your mansion and buy another horse. But reasoning is not always underpinned by reason, at least not if reason is defined as self-interest. Yes, building high school basketball courts is in Under Armour's self-interest, but repairing a school's roof and heating/air conditioning system is not.  

If you're an ad-man with even a semblance of a soul, you dream of having such a client ... not because they are Great ... but because they are Good. So that you can use your mind and motivation to force-multiply a truth, rather than camouflage a lie.  

The slogan for Plank's Sagamore Whiskey is: "Risk-Takers and History Makers" and so here is a Spec Ad we created for it.

Kind of sounds like ... Steemians, doesn't it?

So, I'll finish where I started. Would this make a good Under Armour advertisement?

Quill

And because images don't always download, here's the text to the poems:

Achilles or Hector?

Most men they take note, of words that he wrote, 
Of Homer, this man with a tale, 
Great city, destroy; the story of Troy, 
As ships by the thousands, set sail.   

Not strange that it be, not all do agree,  
On this, most famous oration, 
What lessons to learn; what wisdoms, discern, 
What things, held high by ovation?   

Achilles or Hector, victor … protector, 
Of heroes, which one would you choose, 
Which one most admire, which one hence aspire, 
Achilles you win … if Hector, you lose?   

Chose him, the Greeks; Achilles’ mystique, 
For Victory … it meant but to win, 
Would Athens it laude, this man as a god,  
For losing, most mortal of sins.   

But others demurred, on the honors conferred, 
For them, the laurels misplaced,  
More than their lot, was why they had fought, 
Hector, his motives more chaste.  

Achilles was vain, fought to glory attain, 
Hector, he fought for his clan, 
Died for his city, and hence would they pity,  
… Lesser the soldier, greater the man.   

Come might it, surprise; who would Hector apprise, 
Of him, they’d write it, a tome, 
Include in their lore, descent from the war,  
Made Troy … ancestor of Rome.   

The Romans opined, how honor’s defined, 
And Hector became their ideal, 
Ought fate one defy, if fate would have die, 
Stand fast … in face of ordeal.   

All men can they choose, for things that they’d lose, 
Such choice, the lifeblood of life,  
In refusal to yield, a truth there revealed, 
Defined … are men by their strife.   

All men will decide, what find they inside, 
Soldier and sailor and farmer, 
It’s all about soul, what Rome did extol,  
Hector … Good Man under armour.  

Risk-Takers & History-Makers

Are called they fools, they break the rules,
Stay not within the lines,
Defy the gods to beat the odds,
Let not the norms define.

They roll the dice and pay the price,
They double down on fate,
They draw their swords and march towards,
Great battles that await.

And by their blades is history made,
Like noble knights of lore,
The great risk-takers ... and history-makers,
Their spirit ... Sagamore.

This article also appears on my WEKU blog.

 You guys know the drill. Be verbose ... but articulate. 

And remember ...     

Go Love A Starving Poet  

For God's sake ... they're starving!