Great Ads #6 - Schmitt Sohne Riesling

One of the primary jobs of an ad is to stop the reader and grab her attention. Think of it as the "Made you look!" phenomenon. I ran across this ad for Schmitt Sohne Riesling in an issue of People, from Fall 2005.

This ad utilizes an odd visual image to stop you. There you go flipping through the magazine when suddlenly this goofy image stops you; it simply doesn't look right to the eye. That little German guy is just entirely out of place in the lovely, soothing photo image of the lady enjoying a relaxing bath in her stylish, cozy bathroom suite. [I'm reminded of those childhood puzzles entitled, "Find the thing that's out of place in this picture." Do any of you remeber those?]

The ad goes from goofy to hilarious once your eye reaches the headline: "Unwind with a little German." That's a great line of ad copy, truly excellent.

To be fair, I'm not sure how effectively the particular brand of wine is presented, though. This ad might accomplish the task of reminding me to think about German wines ... Schmitt Shohne Riesling to a lesser extent. I might also remember the blue bottle, which serves as a visual beacon or icon.

"Unwind with a Little German" ... great humor, great stopper image. One of the best things about the ad is that it doesn't try to do too much. It's not full of heavy copy--doesn't need to be. Aside from the headline, there's only one sentence of copy. This ad allows the photo and the headline to do the work.

Kudos to Schmitt Sohne. You've given us another "riesling" to think about German white wine.