champagne campaign

No matter where you go or what you are doing, product placement is everywhere. Intentional or not, it has more of a place in our society than ever before. It has successfully surpassed television and film, making its way into literature, countless magazines, music, restaurants, and so on. Although it may not be as obvious as in TV and movies, companies are anxious to get product/name/logo recognition, while attempting to remain as mainstream as possible. Consumers, however, meet the manufacturers half way. Any time you wear a company’s brand name across your chest, it can be considered product placement in the form of a walking advertisement. You, the consumer (and product endorser), may not think twice about the brand names on your belongings, but most likely, the people around you do recognize names and logos, and thus, companies gain more mainstream recognition.

This has also been happening a lot in the music industry. A singer, for example, may want to portray a certain image and will brand-name-drop throughout his or her lyrics. Once the song hits mainstream radio and is repeated hourly, any and all brand names mentioned are being transmitted into the listening audiences’ ears. The effects of this can be as excessive as consumers going out and purchasing the brand names mentioned because they admire the singer’s ability and, by extension, what the singer thinks is cool enough to mention in a song. It is similar to a celebrity endorsement, except the celebrity is not getting paid to mention the product (in most cases). And this form of product placement goes beyond the clothing industry… consider the beverage industry: Like Coke, Cristal has become another household name.

Here are some examples of lyrics full of brand names:

From “My Humps” by the Black-Eyed Peas:
They buy me all these ices/ Dolce & Gabbana/ Fendi and NaDonna/ Seven Jeans, True Religion’s/ I say no, but they keep givin’

Ludacris is also guilty of name-dropping in his song “Numba One Spot:”
Ready to break the steerin column on yo’ Impala/ …But can buy anything I want from the records I’ve sold/ Jacuzzi’s hot, Cristal is so cold

Snoop Dogg loves his Chucktailer sneakers enough to rap about them in “Signs:”
Where helicopters got cameras, just to get a glimpse of our Chucks

Probably the guiltiest one of all, Jay-Z, up until recently, referred to Cristal champagne, among other brand names, in various rap songs. Over the summer, an executive for the high-priced champagne shunned the attention, saying in an interview with The Economist magazine that the name-dropping was “unwelcome attention.” Jay-Z retaliated by halting all sales of Cristal at his 40/40 nightclubs, and at the time of the controversy, considered omitting all Cristal references from lyrics in such songs as “Can’t Knock The Hustle” (Auto off the champagne, Cristal’s by the bottle), “Dead Presidents” (Got the city drinkin Cristal), “Feelin’ It” (Cristal on ice I like to toast), and “Brooklyn’s Finest” (Cristal forever, play the crib when it’s mink weather).

So don’t be too surprised if all you hear is Dom (as in Dom Perignon champagne) throughout Jay-Z’s next rap album.