Almost perfect marketing
November 21, 2008 By: almostgotit Category: Barf, Barf laundry powder, humor, markeing, marketing
I’m so glad I’m not the only one who gets things wrong sometimes. A colleague of my husband’s passed this photo on from a colleague of HIS who lives in Kurdistan. The stuff is made by an Iranian company, apparently, with “Barf” being an approximation of the Farsi word for “Snow.” But Russians wash with Barf, too.
Judging by the expensive orthodontia on those skinny white people on the box, however, I wonder if it isn’t really just a plain old Amuricun emetic?
November 21st, 2008 at 8:40 am
Hilarious!
From what I gather, international marketing is tricky. I read once about some other marketing translation gaffes, including an American curling iron whose name meant “piece of sh*t” in German. Oops.
November 21st, 2008 at 9:55 am
That is funny….but also quite interesting that given the location that you mentioned on where this is produced, why would they offer such a western style family for imagery. Regardless, made me laugh.
November 21st, 2008 at 11:47 am
Haha! I love translations. You should check out http://www.engrishfunny.com
Hilarious stuff…
November 22nd, 2008 at 1:11 pm
“Barf — turns your whites a lovely shade of puke!”
It’s true about international marketing. I remember reading that Chevrolet had trouble selling their Nova in Mexico until someone realized that “no va” means something to the effect of “it doesn’t go” in Spanish.