IBM Enlisting ‘M.A.S.H.’ Cast for Campaign : Replaces Chaplin in TV Ads to Stress Teamwork
To back its new line of personal computers announced last week, International Business Machines is mounting a huge advertising campaign, complete with a new cast of TV commercial characters.
Charlie Chaplin, a staple of IBM advertising for six years, has been replaced by the cast of the hit TV series “M.A.S.H.,” who have swapped combat fatigues for civilian clothing and are depicted in offices, not field hospitals.
IBM will not release a figure, but trade sources have put the cost of the campaign, which made its debut on television last Thursday night, at $50 million, a sum underlining the significance of the new products for the company.
In 1986, IBM spent $47 million on promoting its entire personal computer system, according to Leading National Advertisers, a research group.
The four new machines, unveiled after months of anticipation, mark a major effort by IBM to reassert its dominance in the personal computer market. The world’s largest computer company has seen its share eroded by a host of competitors.
Apart from the big budget that enables IBM to saturate the airwaves, the company hopes to win national attention for its new PC look by revamping the content of its ads from Chaplin to “M.A.S.H.”
Connected Environment
Arthur Einstein, president of Lord Geller Federico Einstein, the ad agency that produced the ads, explained that the lonely tramp fitted the original IBM PCs, which were very much “stand-alone” products. “They were for one person to solve one person’s problems,” he said.
The new Personal System/2 products, however, stress several computers and people working together. “IBM has gone from one person to many persons working in a connected business environment,” Einstein said.
The “M.A.S.H.” cast, he said, fits IBM’s new strategy because they are associated with the idea of a team working together to solve problems.
The main difference, of course, is that the “M.A.S.H.” team has moved to an office environment. One commercial, for example, highlights quick computer cooperation solving a problem for Loretta Swit (Hot Lips Houlihan), Wayne Rogers (Trapper John) and Jamie Farr (Klinger). All the characters play white-collar workers in a manufacturing plant.
In another ad, Gary Burghoff (Radar) uses his new computer to answer a blizzard of telephone queries.
The campaign will also include newspaper, magazine and radio advertising.
Of the “M.A.S.H.” cast, only Alan Alda (Hawkeye) and David Ogden Stiers (Winchester) have refrained from taking part in the new IBM campaign. Alda used to be a spokesman for Atari, another PC maker.
