Adverts in the Beano

[Al]

This topic has been started because the post that istigated it had veered off-topic from the Beano Forum topic entitled This Weeks Issue (http://comicsuk.co.uk/Forum/viewtopic.p ... &start=345).

Al

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I was a bit narked by the "free poster" thing as well! Lately, the Beano's been going out of its way to make adverts come across as normal parts of the comic, and frankly I'm not surprised even five-year-olds aren't fooled. Has anyone else noticed that most recent issues of the Beano (those which contain any adverts at all - the advert count's been a bit of a roller-coaster these last few weeks!) contain a front page sell for an advertisement inside, as if it were something to buy the comic about? (This is quite an old tradition, but it's only now the sells have been so prominent - formerly, it was typically limited to the text above the title reading, "Great Brand Name Here Prizes To Be Won - Inside!")

The thing about two-page adverts, which marketing execs plainly don't understand if they're prepared to pay top dollar for them, is that they actually attract less attention than only one page. If there's a comic strip on the opposite page, then there's a chance I might cast my eye over the advert. But if I turn the page and see nothing but an advert, I'll go straight onto the next page and not pay it a single glance! This goes for two-pagers in newspapers too - the Guardian carries quite a lot of them, as well as always having an advert on the back page (because the sports news is in a supplement instead of the back pages these days).

I'm guessing DCT know this, hence the amount of attention they try to draw to such adverts (such as branding them "free posters", and putting their pagination where their mouth is by carefully making sure only their own ads, instead of comics, appear on what would have been the back of the poster). This may also have something to do with the fact that two separate comic strips never appear on opposite pages in the Beano any more (with the exception of Freddie Fear/Super School a couple of weeks ago, but that was plainly covering for unsold ad slots), with the other page always being either an advert or filler.

Changing fashions in advertising intrigue me - in the case of older comics, sometimes almost as much as the strips themselves. For example, there is a very clear divide on the week that junk food advertising aimed at children was outlawed - it had hitherto formed about 75% of the Beano's ad content! Reading Beanos from 2001, when practically every issue contained adverts for Turkey Twizzlers and Sunny Delight, is quite an experience.

There was also a vogue, from at least the early 1990s up to the early 2000s, for adverts in the form of comic strips masquerading as part of the comic itself. In many cases, these were lent added fascination by the use of artists who actually drew some regular strips in the comic at the time. For instance, one of the last survivors, a pseudo-strip series for Milky Way, which was still around in 2004, was drawn by Nigel Parkinson. There was also a relatively long-running advert for BN biscuits, with a new 'strip' every week; I don't know the artist's name, but he was also drawing Korky the Cat at the time (about 2001) and was one of Tom Paterson's semi-regular ghosters on Minnie the Minx later on.

The pseudo-strip era, of course, had a revival recently, with Diego being employed by Lego (who seem to have taken over from Bernard Matthews as the Beano's most regular purchasers of promotions and ad pages). But I think my favourite comic advert series of all time was not a strip, as such, but a rather beautifully illustrated ongoing saga called "Search for the Rowntree" (all about Fruit Pastilles and such, so wouldn't be allowed today). I still don't know how it ended - it could be I'm simply missing the right issues of the Beano and Dandy (it ran in both comics simultaneously), or maybe Rowntree simply decided to pull the plug. (See what I did there?)

[Jonny Whizz]

I agree about the junk food advertising - it does seem strange now to look back at Beanos from less than a decade ago, where such advertising was commonplace. There also used to be many adverts for Chessington World of Adventures in the comic, due to the Beanoland tie-in, but these disappeared once the license expired. So these days, the Beano can only really advertise toys and games - this is why the Beano seems to have so few adverts in it now compared to when I started reading it in 2002.

[swirlythingy]

Not really advert related, but on the subject of expiring licenses: you may have noticed that whenever the Beano gives away sweets, it says Haribo on the packet. (Indeed, that very company ran a couple of promotions several years ago to design a sweet and win a trip to the Haribo factory - a cut above the usual sort of advert-competition!) But if you go back to the first half of the 2000s, where there is evidence of an edible free gift, it's always Swizzels Matlow. I think they ran a larger promotion once as well, but I can't remember the details or the date. I prefer Swizzels Matlow products, myself. They used to give away giant Refresher bars, which were much classier than today's tiny packets of Starmix.

Anyway, it seems likely that sweets aren't just a one-off promotion by a company pushing its product at a likely target audience, unlike, say, the Lego minifigures (although we've had so many of them I am beginning to wonder). I wonder who's paying who? There's no obvious benefit in it for Haribo, since you don't exactly have to persuade kids to buy sweets in the same way as you would e.g. Moshi Monsters...

[PaulTwist]

The thing about two-page adverts, which marketing execs plainly don't understand if they're prepared to pay top dollar for them, is that they actually attract less attention than only one page. If there's a comic strip on the opposite page, then there's a chance I might cast my eye over the advert. But if I turn the page and see nothing but an advert, I'll go straight onto the next page and not pay it a single glance! This goes for two-pagers in newspapers too - the Guardian carries quite a lot of them, as well as always having an advert on the back page (because the sports news is in a supplement instead of the back pages these days).

I work closely with a marketing department, and it's definitely, categorically, 100% NOT the case that centre page ads attract less attention. These things aren't just dreamt up on a whim by marketers. Response rates have been tested over years to prove which ad positions are the most effective, and the centre pages is up near the top, regardless of whether or not you pay attention to them - but the very fact you're discussing the ad in a public forum shows that it's done its job.

Do I like ads in centre pages of comics? No. They're an annoyance. But if a comic lives or dies on its ad revenue, they're a necessary evil.

[PaulTwist]

I wonder who's paying who? There's no obvious benefit in it for Haribo, since you don't exactly have to persuade kids to buy sweets in the same way as you would e.g. Moshi Monsters...

I don't know this for sure, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if no money is changing hands - Haribo provide the sweets for free as they're securing great advertising for the price of a few thousand bags of sweets, and DCT are getting an extra incentive to buy the comic. Obviously, only DCT's commercial dept will know for sure, but this is the most likely scenario I reckon.

[diegotheterrible]

...if a comic lives or dies on its ad revenue, they're a necessary evil.

I totally agree, not to mention it's fun to draw those LEGO ads, and while i miss Ivy very much, commercial work's become my lifeblood as of late