What happens when your morning mug of coffee is accompanied by a mug shot of the celebrity endorser in whom you’ve invested millions of dollars? There's not enough cream ‘n sugar in the world to make that particular cuppa joe taste better.
But is it bitter enough to pull the ads featuring your bad boy? For T-Mobile, yes.
They did some nice work recently featuring Dr. J, Magic Johnson, DWade and Charles Barkley, but Chuck did his own work on the Scottsdale roadways earlier this year, ushering in the New Year behind the wheel with a blood-alcohol level of .149 percent , nearly twice the legal limit of .08 percent in Arizona.
T-Mobile has pulled the ads. Charles has also lost his NBA studio gig on TNT. Oops.
Wicked, wicked alcohol. It’ll get you in trouble and lose you lots of good things, like jobs and endorsements. And the things that go with them, like really colorful suits and the freedom to gamble away $10 million over a few years. Plus, people will enjoy making fun of you (although it’ll also put you in some pretty prestigious company). Oops.
For now, all the interested parties have done what’s expected of them. Charles has apologized and T-Mobile has scrapped the ads, but like Marv Albert, Steve Howe, Bill Clinton, and probably even Pacman Jones, they’ll be back.
It’s not the illegal part that makes me crazy. It’s the stupid part. It’s watching golden eggs fly away when all you have to do is sit on them. Sad truth is, for the uber talented, there are always more golden eggs.
2 comments:
i'm sorry, but chuck needs to come back. i might be wrong numbers-wise--that is, i'm sure there's some stats genius who could break down some demographic stuff to disagree with me--but chuck has as loyal a fanbase as any other tv personality right now; maybe ever. that tnt bball studio show is the best of all time, and it's all because of chuck.
i think that morally, you can make the case that chuck needs at least a serious timeout. the dui is just the most recent of morally questionable actions on his part, and it's serious enough to deserve punitive action simply because he is such a role model. but it is exactly because he is such a beloved role model that from a business perspective this makes no sense to me. the tnt ratings will suffer tremendously, i'll betcha.
then again, kobe got his deals back, so there's no way you can expect chuck to stay out of the public eye for too long.
If you asked Chuck's fans, they'd never say "pull him," because they love him for the very reason he got pulled. But the corporate entities had to do the pc thing. Remember:
"I am not a role model." If you don't remember it, look it up.
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