Backward Glances

“Run the Risk of Being Noticed” has been our mantra to clients big and small since opening our doors 30 years ago. Taking calculated risk is what gets you visibility and memorability amidst the clutter and clamor. And focusing on your target consumer’s yearnings gets you sales and brand loyalty.

So on Thursday we posted a billboard design on I-26 with a woman’s taut and shapely buns bursting out one side. Its headline asks drivers, “Want one?” Our clients at Barre Evolution, Nancy Meyer and Nicole Wallen, had the courage to trust us and approve it. The response, after just five days, has been sensational--and overwhelmingly positive.

It started with an avalanche of attagirls on the Barre Evolution and WCBD-TV facebook pages. Then Channel 4 sent a reporter and aired a 5-minute newscast twice yesterday, interviewing Nicole, showing exercise classes and flashing shots of the billboard. Radio banter followed on WTMA Talk Radio. The media, inevitably, are asking viewers, listeners and readers to vote yea or nay to the billboard on their websites. Roughly 90% love it. 10% are variously horrified at its audacity, cheesiness and female exploitation.

What’s (forgive us) the bottom line? An onrush of new students are discovering and signing up at Barre Evolution studios in West Ashley and Mount Pleasant. By month’s end, two-thirds of local adult females will have seen posterior proof that Barre Evolution is The Method for Every Body.

In advertising, it just doesn’t get any better than this.