Ads - Part 14

Billboards

Today's topic is billboards.  Many, like this Abercrombie and Fitch "Naughty or nice" billboard, are suggestive but don't actually show anything.

This truck in London carrying a billboard of Alice Cooper caused some kind of incident in 1972.

Here's the image on the  billboard, with Alice Cooper dressed in nothing but a snake

A bathroom store in Nottinghamshire, England, was forced to take down this poster of a naked woman showering.  Officials said it breached town planning rules.

The store owner retaliated by putting up this giant poster of a naked man in a bathtub in his store window.  It was a way to give the finger to the town officials.  Because it was inside the store, town planning rules didn't apply.

40 years ago, Miami carpet store owner Don Bailey posed for this billboard, copying Burt Reynolds' Cosmopolitan centerfold.  He became locally known as the "naked carpet guy".

This recent billboard (actually, it's on the side of a truck) shows his original pose at top left, him posing 40 years later at top right, and his son, Don Jr., posing at the bottom.  Looks like Miami will have a naked carpet guy for some time to come.

Here's a billboard for Equinox gyms.  Equinox made me do it!

This Los Angeles billboard for Manhunt, a gay dating site, generated complaints from area parents, even though it has no nudity.  Apparently they couldn't stand the idea of two men attracted to each other.

This British billboard for fitness company PerfectUK was banned by Britain's Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) after receiving complaints.  Ironically, the ASA did not uphold the complaints that it was offensive and inappropriate.  It was banned for the bureaucratic reason that the owner of PerfectUK, Lorenz International, failed to respond to ASA inquiries.

A billboard for Tom Ford Neroli Portofino fragrance.  We've seen before how fragrance companies like nudity in their ads, and that seems to apply to billboards, too.

We end with an electronic billboard in Atlanta.  One problem with electronic billboards is that they can be hacked.  This one was hacked into displaying the "goatse" image of a man spreading his ass cheeks and stretching his gaping hole.  Probably not what the billboard owner was trying to sell.