Like Pepsi, Kendall is not even the real thing
The rise and fall of the Pepsi advert reminds us that advertising is no longer a one-way street, writes Ciara O’Connor
KIM Kardashian famously ‘broke the internet’ with her oiled-up derriere balancing a champagne glass on the cover of Paper magazine; it seems her sister Kendall Jenner put the internet back together with her catastrophic Pepsi ad last week.
Possibly for the first time ever, the internet was united in a common view, a shared derision, a communal outrage.
For those of you who missed it, Pepsi released a two-minute advertisement starring 21-year-old human cake-pop Kendall Jenner as a kind of de-facto leader of a non-specific youth resistance movement. The backlash was instantaneous and vitriolic. Pepsi pulled the ad and issued an apology, saying they had “missed the mark”.
The advert opened with Kendall doing what Kendall does best, pretending to be a model, on the side of a street where thousands of good looking multi-ethnic youngsters are marching against… something. It’s not clear.
Kendall, apparently stirred by the atmosphere of revolution and having caught the eye of a sexy man, tears off her blonde wig and wipes away her lipstick to join her beautiful peers.
Having been welcomed like a long-lost friend amid fist bumps and smiles, our heroine senses some tension between the police and protesters. Kendall grabs a Pepsi and brazenly walks up to the best-looking cop who receives it gratefully and takes a sip. The crowd erupts in cheers. Everyone is friends. The End. We are urged to “Live Bolder”, “Live for now”.
The suggestion is that Jenner witnesses the protest literally passing her by and realises that there are some things more important than being photographed, that there is a world beyond the camera in front of her.
The delicious irony, of course, is that while we are watching fictional Jenner realise that there is more to life than wigs, lipstick and cameras, the real Kendall Jenner is being paid stupid money to be filmed, with a team of hairstylists and make-up artists on hand, to sell something. It’s almost too perfect. Almost immediately after the advert’s release, the in- ternet imploded. The alt-right were disgusted that Pepsi felt the need to legitimise the ‘snowflake’ generation of protesters. However, mostly people couldn’t believe the co-opting of contemporary protest imagery and the blatant dismissal of the very real problem of police brutality in the US to sell fizzy pop.
While us millennials may sometimes have a tendency towards hyper-sensitivity, this advert was a slap in the face to the Black Lives Matter movement. The image of young, graceful, white Kendall Jenner standing in front of the Pepsi police mirrored exactly young, graceful, black Ieshia Evans whose picture standing with her arms crossed, long dress flowing, in front of riot police went viral across the world last year as a symbol of the Black Lives Matter movement and resistance. Evans was arrested.
The fact borne out multiple times in the United States is that it is categorically unsafe for young black people to approach police at protests. Kendall handed Officer Cutiepie a Pepsi; kids in America have been murdered by cops for less.
To suggest that the systemic problem of police brutality and racism can be solved with a cold bevvy, and to use a young beautiful white woman who is most famous for being born into privilege and money to do it, is so astoundingly tone-deaf that some have wondered whether the whole thing was a Trumpian publicity stunt.
I don’t think so: I can see the conversation in the marketing department when they came up the concept.
“So, we want to engage millennials in our brand — how do we do that? What are they into?”
“Well, they really like protesting stuff — like, they’re quite an ethically conscious bunch. Can we do meaningful marketing? So hot right now. It worked for Dove.”
“Brilliant! Protests! But wait — we don’t want to actually take a position on any of the stuff they care about in case we alienate anyone, right? And their protests are quite, like, angry — and angry isn’t sexy.”
“That’s OK! We won’t have them protesting anything specific — the signs can be as vague as possible — we can have them say ‘join the conversation’ or in Chinese, and a lot of peace signs! And everyone could be really young and well dressed and good looking and happy!”
“Mmm, I don’t know — no celebrity who knows anything about this stuff or who actually cares will go for it. It’s too transparent, isn’t it?”
“No worries! We’ll get in Kendall Jenner; she’s doesn’t have a notion! And she’s hot!” “Genius! Done!” Poor, poor stupid, sacrificial lamb Kendall. When the ad was pulled by Pepsi a mere 12 hours after they brought it out, they apologised for ‘putting Jenner in this position’. But it’s hard to feel too sorry for her. Her family’s empire has been built on courting controversy and being talked about, and as she herself once said, “One of the best lessons I ever learned from my sisters is not to take everything so seriously. Just leave it alone — it will pass in a week.” She might be right.
The huge PR machine behind the Kardashians will have pored over the script and played out the possible reactions before anything happened.
They will have decided it’s worth it. And her fee will have been eye-watering.
Kendall will bounce back. Things won’t change much for Pepsi: people will still prefer Coke. Most of us will be baffled that there are still people who drink sugar-filled fizzy water.
The 12-hour viral rise and fall of the Pepsi advert is a modern fable of marketing, social media and celebrity. Brands will be more aware than ever that advertising is no longer a one-way street: it’s a conversation. They are unlikely to use life-and-death politics, without taking a position, to sell stuff to millennials again.
For all the lofty arguments and notions being fired across the internet, the most significant result will probably be the next time a waiter says “Sorry, is Pepsi all right?” the response is likely to come, “URGH. Not really — but OK, if that’s all you’ve got.”