Shpilkes Lands Major Coca-Cola PR Account

* * * For Immediate Release * * *

(Sioux City, Iowa)  Shpilkes Discount Marketing announced the award of a major public relations contract with Coca-Cola Inc.  The contract covers marketing, communications, and brand management in the face of a disastrous advertising campaign by Coke.

On Sunday, February 2, 2014, during the Super Bowl, Coca-Cola premiered an ad titled "It's Beautiful", featuring the song "America the Beautiful" sung in a number of different languages by people of various ethnic backgrounds.

You can watch the commercial here.

Criticism on the Interweb was swift and merciless.  A sample of Facebook comments:

"I understand what all are saying but this is AMERICA'S National Anthem. Can we go elsewhere and sing their anthem in our language. Absolutely not! we would have to learn or get left behind. Simple."

"America the Beautiful should be sung in American!"

 "English is the official language of the United States.."

Coke executives are terrified of losing a major market segment consisting of people who:

• Can't tell the difference between "America the Beautiful" and "The Star Spangled Banner",
• Think that "American" is a language, and
• Think that the United States has an official language*. 

Girnt Shpilkes, CEO of Shpilkes Discount Marketing, outlined the first steps in re-addressing this market segment:

"Our first challenge is to define the segment.  We have identified the average consumer in this space as ill-informed and racist, but possessing the ability to send a text or Tweet on a mobile phone.  We are now referring to this group as the "dumb with thumbs" segment."

 

 

 To cater to this segment, a special redesign of the familiar Coke can has been developed.

Coke executives have announced they are increasing the reach of their sponsorship activities.  In addition to NASCAR, the NBA, and the Special Olympics, in 2014 Coke will be a major sponsor of the Darwin Awards.
 
After reviewing the texts of the unfavorable Interweb posts, Coca-Cola has dropped sponsorship of regional literacy programs, introducing  a new slogan:

 

 * Correction, 2/3/2014: Although the U.S. does not have an official language, some states have designated one.  Iowa, for example, has two official languages: English and a series of nonsense syllables made popular by Congressman Steve King.)