Ground Floor/Sheila O'Flanagan: A recent letter to the Irish Times struck a chord with me because I'd been thinking the very same thing just a few minutes earlier, having caught sight of the poster in question. Jean Hogan wrote to say that she sent political canvassers running because she was offended by the campaign slogan "Let's Get Goin' with Eoin".
I agree wholeheartedly with Jean - when I first saw it I wondered how many people sitting around a table came up with the catch-phrase and if, after it was mooted, they thought it was snappy and innovative and would market their man as the one to beat in the European elections. Was there much back-slapping and congratulations as they decided that everyone else would be pounded to dust by the power of the campaign slogan?
In a world dominated by snappy advertising slogans, can politicians afford to think that some gruesome rhyming will pull in the punters?
Advertising is a tricky business. The more something is forced at me, for example, the more I'm likely to take against it! Saturation coverage for a product on TV only means that I swear never to buy it again. Advertisements that suggest that the expensiveness of the product only proves my good taste makes me want to throttle someone.
And yet the marketing departments of major corporations have the biggest budgets of them all.
In the past two decades, the big players have dramatically increased their advertising spends in trying to bring their products to a global market - Coca Cola and McDonald's, for example, increased spending by approximately 200 per cent and 425 per cent respectively.
The ad agencies have become increasingly dominant in the marketplace - according to US trade magazine AdAge, worldwide revenue from 2003 advertising and media activities of US agency brands was $205.4 billion (€171.6 billion).
The market is dominated by five major agency groups who pulled in an average of over $3 billion in the year to put their clients' messages in our minds.
The best advertising slogans are simple and memorable. They should leave us with a positive feeling towards the brand. And the best slogans stay with us forever.
I still remember talking about putting a tiger in your tank with my parents as we stopped at the local Esso station. The "Work, Rest and Play" slogan for Mars remains etched on my consciousness despite its replacement with "Pleasure You Can't Measure". And if Heinz currently has a slogan it's still obscured by the "Beanz Meanz Heinz" mantra of my childhood.
Interestingly, all of those companies are still going strong, which implies that if you can promote brand loyalty you have a consumer for life, although you need to continue to reinforce the message for new generations with ads that are just as zippy.
For Pepsi Cola nothing has quite matched "Come Alive - You're in the Pepsi Generation" even though the Pepsi generation is now rushing towards retirement. Their own children are of the L'Oreal generation, where they buy premium-priced products because they're worth it.
The key issue with an advertising slogan is not to leave a negative response with the target audience. It shouldn't be bland or generic either. And it should mean something to you. Unfortunately most politicians fail in that regard. And sadly, "Let's Get Goin' with Eoin" means nothing. Except maybe to the man himself.
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It wasn't really advertising that brought fledgling airline JetGreen to its knees last week. The advertising was pretty straightforward. Seats for €1 to a range of destinations. Most especially to Malaga and Alicante, where Irish investors bought into the sun, sand and sea dream, so ably advertised to us in the past.
Anyway, JetGreen worked on the principle that people would buy seats for 1 but would also buy the more expensive seats too. Why on earth would they think that? If someone is advertising a flight for €1 to a holiday destination I might elect to buy it but it certainly doesn't mean I'll want to shell out 200 for another flight at the same time.
The advertising might have been fine but the bottom line is you need a sustainable business plan behind it. And the JetGreen plan was so far from being sustainable that it makes you wonder how they got the money together to manage even a week of flights.
Ryanair, on the other hand, brings advertising down to its most basic level in getting their message across. We're cheap and we get you there. And millions of people, notwithstanding occasional gripes about being stranded in Brussels, know that they will.
Which is why I'm still a believer in the company even in these more straitened times for airlines. The share price has fallen sharply from levels of 7.5 last year to around 4.5 now. The pressure on oil prices won't help. And analysts fear that the market in the low-cost sector has matured to the stage where there is no more room for growth. A profit warning from the company sent the more nervous investors scurrying even though the management had indicated that this might happen.
Given that it's going to be a bit of a slug-fest in the sector, your money would want to be on a carrier with cash in its pocket and an ability to shift its focus quickly and easily. Ryanair can do that - while still saving money by using its in-house advertising.
