Marketing Muck-ups of 2009

Australian media and marketing site mUmBRELLA has released its list of the worst marketing disasters of 2009. Here are just a few of the "winners".

Smoothie operator Topping the mUmBRELLA list is the Westpac video that purported to explain the bank's slightly overzealous mortgage rate-rising --- by comparing the process to the making and selling of banana smoothies.

Is she a goer? Featuring more bad off-colour puns than a Benny Hill revival was a video entry in an open competition to come up with an ad for the Toyota Yaris. Oddly enough, the "Clean Getaways" entry was initially judged to have won, but was later removed from the competition after complaints were received.

No silver lining While many of the marketing disasters (like those above) were shining examples of "what were they thinking", there were others like the "Man in the Jacket" video that were found to be deliberate hoaxes. We're not sure what's worse, the video showing "Heidi" looking for the dreamboat who left his (Witchery) jacket in a cafe, or the video in which "Heidi" comes clean.