Opinion: The Wide Available Spaces
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After I’d collected my car from the restaurant valet last night, I noticed something unusual on the flipside of the numbered valet key tag -- a teeny ad for HBO’s ‘’entourage,’’ airing June 11. It is, HBO assures web readers, a ‘’hit comedy series’’ about the life of a ‘’hot young actor in modern-day Hollywood, and his entourage.’’
We’ll be the judge of that, of course; it’s especially amusing in light of my colleague Gina Piccalo’s Calendar story today about how the ‘’entourage’’ is passe.
But the issue isn’t HBO and its 3-by-3/4-inch desperate valet-tag ad campaign -- it’s whether anything is off limits. I figured Madison Avenue had done its worst the day I sat down in a restaurant toilet stall a few years ago and saw, fastened to the door in front of me, an ad. Clearly, I have no imagination. Soon the plastic batons that divide orders at the supermarket checkout started carrying ads on all four sides. Ads are glued to the floors of the grocery aisles. Ads are being projected onto sidewalks like the ``Batman’’ summons that Gotham’s leaders flash into the night sky.
The valet tags broke more new ground. What’s next? I predict ... blow-in cards in hymnals. Wait, they may already be doing that.
How about this? Who could resist the opportunity for free media on a dozen television networks’ news programs? As brush fire season roars into gear, it’s only a matter of time before the leased planes and helicopters start carrying ads for flame retardant.