Media – Advertising

I am doing an analysis of the “silver spoon campaign’s” printed adverts for the charity Barnardo’s. I will be explaining the main strategy in the adverts made by the company Bartle, Bogle and Hegarty. And I will also asses their aims and target audience, how the campaign went and if it, in my opinion, succeeded. I will be assessing the images to tell you how they are represented and how they put the message behind the picture, across.

Barnardo’s is a charity for children who are being fostered into care because the parents didn’t have financial status to afford a child. The president of Barnardo’s is Cherie Blair or also known from her maiden name as Booth. The charity where provided with the money to launch a campaign against poverty, in which a million pounds was spent. The campaign was launched in August of two thousand and three and lasted until October of two thousand and three. The reasons for this are that the campaign was banned as the pictures were offensive to people of the general public.

The advertising complaints commission received around five hundred complaints saying that they were shocked and distressed by the advertisements. They went to the advertising standards agency and the ASA ruled that the advertisements would cause wide spread offence and should not be repeated. One million pound’s was spent on the campaign that lasted three months.

The images on the print consist of newly born babies with implements that show a scene, and sense of poverty. The adverts contain babies with objects such as a syringe and mentholated spirits super imposed onto the picture and into the babies mouths another contained a cockroach in his mouth. With this evidence I can see that the main strategy of the campaign is to shock you these are what are known as scare tactics. They want to scare you into reading the text that contains information about their aims. Their aim is to raise awareness of poverty around the UK so they can raise a charitable fortune to put an end to sufferings of people with children living in poverty. They raise issues such as “A child’s chances when born into poverty can be dead against him/ her and very much direct you towards a life of crime and drug abuse in later life”.

In these images the babies are on their backs and the photographer (Miles Aldridge) has taken the pictures on an angle looking at the baby from the side. This makes the baby with the image of, for example a cockroach in its mouth look uncared for and not nurtured. Also the positioning of every baby is on its back showing weakness towards the poverty that he/ she must face. All of these connotative meanings represent the weakness of the child

In comparison, one of the images, which is of a baby with a “silver spoon” in its mouth, we see the baby from a birds eye view. This connotative meaning signifies some one watching over the baby like a mother nurturing a baby. There are other connotative meanings such as the colour in the image; it is gold on a soft cushion. The gold in the image signifies wealth and a good upbringing that the child will have because of the benefits of wealth the cushions shows comfort that the child will witness.

In the other images we see that the surface that the babies are on is firm and looks uncomfortable and the back ground in the images are very indistinguishable. It looks like the room is empty and cold. The colours in the image such as a slimy green and a very dull grey/ white wash on the surfaces make you think and feel that the room is cold and empty. The image of the baby drinking mentholated spirits is on a drunken angle that looks and suggests that the baby will be an alcoholic in later life due the conditions of poverty she/ he has grown up in. the syringe suggests drug abuse, and the cock roach signifies poor living conditions.

These images are trying to get you to read the text in the image. In this text it contains a lot underlying emotion that it try’s to draw from. For example the text next to the images it will contain the name of the baby and how old it is. This makes you feel emotionally drawn to the circumstances that the text outlines that the baby with have to cope with. The photographer in a way takes away the innocence of the baby with the images of drug abuse and the text gives the baby back its innocence and draws you to feel more for the child. The text in one of the images say’s, “If only poverty didn’t crush the spirit, hopes and joy of thousands of children every year. If only poverty didn’t rob them of the choices of a positive future.”

The text is trying to emotionally draw you to making the decision to give money to the charity of Barnardo’s. Because of the information in the text I know who their target audience is. They are looking for people who go to work and earn a wage that is of a sufficient amount a year. To be a bit more precise they are looking for people with disposable incomes and even perhaps people who have children. These adverts draw your emotional feeling for the baby’s position.

In this world of advertising it’s hard to determine weather they failed their aim to raise the awareness of poverty. It brings the question to mind, does bad press in the advertising world potentially fail your aims of advertising? In my opinion this is not nessaccerally true. As people looked at the images in disgust they will see the logo of Barnardo’s and through the shock tactic that the photographer has used they will remember the charity and what they stand for, not nessaccerally in a good light but they will remember. And that in my opinion is successful advertising. Barnardo’s was asked these questions bellow and these are the response they gave.

“What does Barnardo’s think the adverts will achieve?

“The adverts are part of the Barnardo’s campaign 2003 on Child poverty. The one key role of these adverts is to deliver the message across the nations that children growing up in poverty are robbed of their future.”

“These hard-hitting images will cut through the prejudice and apathy that we know exists, and engage with the target audiences and drives them towards supporting Barnardo’s vital work. We want the adverts to provoke debate surrounding child poverty and establish this issue as significant”

“Finally, these adverts will continue to build the position of Barnardo’s as a modern, relevant and deserving charity to maximise our potential for fund raising and influencing social policy for children.”

“The concept behind the silver spoon campaign refers to the proverb “born with a silver spoon in your mouth” meaning to be born into life of opportunity and prosperity.”

“Barnardo’s is using metaphor within the advertising to make the point that not all children are born with the same opportunities or aspirations for the future. Children born into poverty are more likely to have a life that stays hard and a future of homelessness, substance misuse or crime.”

“Using the line ‘not every child is born with a silver spoon,’ there are three different executions each featuring a newly born baby with an object superimposed in his/her mouth in order to demonstrate metaphorically the possible future consequences of children who are born into poverty. The objects chosen are a syringe to signify drug abuse, a bottle of methylated spirits to signify alcohol abuse and a cockroach to signify poor living conditions.”

“There is also a fourth advert in the campaign that shows a newborn baby with a silver spoon with the strap line ‘if only every child in the UK was born with a silver spoon’. This presents Banardo’s vision that the lives of all children should be free from poverty.”

“The cockroach is an effective symbol of poverty. It is an unpleasant and unwelcome pest that thrives in squalid living conditions and blights the lives of those children

And their families that are unable to escape using the cockroach as a symbol of poverty was triggered from the experiences of service users and staff that were consulted.”

“The entire campaign cost £1,000,000 this is less than 1% of turnover, this spend was stretched considerably by the contribution of free recourses from our agencies and negotiating reductions of cost”

Isn’t that a lot just for print? Wouldn’t the money be better spent on your projects?

“The spend is less than 1% of turn over and is a fraction compared to other organisations’ advertising activities. This budget has been stretched considerably due to the reduction of costs through out the development of the campaign, for example, the photographer Miles Aldridge waived his fees, and we have been given agencies’ resources for free”

“Poverty is a key part of Barnardo’s vision. We need to address the lack of awareness and apathy that we know exists surrounding child poverty in the UK . The campaigning activities are vital to ensure that the public are aware of Barnardo’s work and that Barnardo’s continues to be positioned in the mind of the public as a modern and relevant charity to stimulate deservedness and provide a climate for fundraising and influencing”

Did you use real babies for the ad’s?

“Yes we used babies of between two and fifteen weeks old who were bathed and then had special make up and petroleum jelly dabbed onto their skin to signify that they were new born babies. There was a nurse on the photography shoot as well as the babies’ mothers who were able to swap stories and chat to the photographer who has three young children of his own.”

Aren’t you encouraging young children to put dangerous objects into their mouths?

“The adverts are not targeted at small children and will be shown predominantly in news papers.

We photographed the babies separately and then superimposed the objects as a later date in order to create the illusion that the objects were in the babies mouths.”

My responses to the advertisements were of mixed messages. I can’t agree that leading a life of poverty can nessacerally lead to a life of drug abuse and a life of squalor, it’s the choices the child makes, and it is up to other people such as parents and drugs education teachers to try and deter their child from making the wrong decisions. In this advertisement they have provided a stereotypical outlook on people who live in poverty, this brings present a lack of sensitivity to the poor population in the UK , who’s argument is that of offence to the poor population. The up roar that is concerning these advertisements in my opinion is exact. These adverts are offensive as it could create repute between the social classes of society and label these people with an image. The advertisements should be banned. I do not think that the target audience would sympathise with the children in these circumstances so therefore I think that the campaign is at loss.

I think they have succeeded in their aim to raise the awareness of child poverty and their brand awareness in the UK but through neglectful language they have failed the campaign by failing to reach their audience with a positive message. They make fair points that poverty can change a child’s life and choices and may lead to missed opportunity but they are insensitive. The pictures implicate that people who live in poverty do not care for their children, it is in a very subtle way that this is put to the audience but I can see the subtle offence that the public may have picked up on. One million pounds was spent on this campaign and it was then later banned, this with care and sensitivity could have been avoided and successful.