Above is an ad for Molson that ran in Cosmo magazine… obviously targeted towards women.

And below is an ad for Molson that ran in Playboy magazine, obviously targeted towards men.

There’s nothing wrong with running multiple ads geared towards different audiences, but the ad for men explains how the ad for women was “scientifically formulated to enhance their perception of men who drink Molson.”

At one level, it’s amusing, especially if you work in the advertising or marketing industry…

But on another level, it’s a little disturbing and insulting, to both men and women.

What I find interesting is that this campaign ran about 8 years ago. That’s not too long ago, but I wondered how many people would have seen an article on the web about such a campaign 8 years ago versus today.

And even more interesting is the divergence of comments on the piece.

Looking back in advertising history, nixing Joe Camel from cigarette advertisements seems obvious. Cigarette cause cancer, and a cartoon grabs the attention of children.

But hindsight is always 20/20, isn’t it?

According to the New York Times, the federal government is looking to make some similar changes to food advertising and marketing. With obesity being the epidemic it is, it only seems right to start putting bans on what types of ads can be aimed at kids for particular foods. As the article describes, “Regulators are asking food makers and restaurant companies to make a choice: make your products healthier or stop advertising them to youngsters.” Makes perfect sense to me.

Of course, it’s never that easy. You have the debate about exactly how healthy something needs to be to use a cartoon character, and so on… but you also have to wonder – how much should the government really control advertising?

I’m a nutrition nut, so I’m biased. I think that a lot of things need to change about the way we eat, and I would not be at all against stripping Toucan Sam off that box of Froot Loops. But is that fair?

I did a piece titled “Crayons” and Kerry did one titled “Every Moment is Golden”