Advertising is in a sorry state at the moment. Gone are the days of the catchy jingles and clever ideas. In 2023, chances someone in the marketing department has seen something on YouTube or TikTok and shamelessly copied it to shill whatever. Adverts are designed to annoy, going on the principle that “any publicity is good publicity”.

Adverts for cars are particularly irritating. They tend to show a left-hand drive vehicle cruising down the wrong side of the road (translation: the company were too tight to pay for a British ad and just use the same one they made for mainland Europe), along mountain roads or through a desert. The music playing will either be a brash load of mumbo jumbo or a breathy, twee cover of a pop classic. At the end, the manufacturer’s logo will appear alongside a meaningless slogan, and you’re left none the wiser about the car they are advertising.

Show me some useful information! How much does it cost? How many miles can I do between filling up/charging it? How big is the boot? Will it be able to get round the tight corners of a British town that was laid out in the medieval period?

Here’s an example. This is a recent advert for the Peugeot 408. It is remarkable in the way the voiceover manages to say so many words that mean absolutely nothing whatsoever.

I know nothing of any substance about the Peugeot 408 after watching that advert, other than what it looks like. Ridiculous!

Sometimes, a car advert doesn’t need to be particularly useful to be memorable. Here is an ad for the Skoda Fabia from 2007. I remember it from my childhood.

You don’t learn anything about the Fabia in this ad – not even what it looks like, since the car is made entirely out of cake. But it was clever, and it was soundtracked by an actual song from a real artist. I can still recall it 16 years later. That is what good advertising looks like.

Still, if adverts for cars are bad, then adverts for selling your car are even worse. Mufasa can well and truly sod off with this.

Do you have a suggestion for something that needs to sod off? Do let me know.