False Advertising

Descriptive Essay # 104268

Advertising
Advertising > Product-Specific
Business > Companies

False Advertising

An analysis of a particular advert for sport equipment that demonstrates how advertising can be very misleading.

1,474 words () | 4 sources | APA | 2008 United States

Paper Summary:

This paper examines an advert in the June 2007 edition of "Men's Health". It is an advert for the new Bowflex Xtreme SE Home Gym, which is an exercise machine (a copy of the advert is included in the paper). It discusses how the advert is misleading and does not include basic information such as the price of the product and where it is manufactured. It also discusses its use of visual imagery and how unrealistic it is.

From the Paper:

"The product is an exercise machines. It is "built to provide fast and easy total body results right in our own home" and apparently "performs over 65 gym-quality exercises - as many as an entire health club filled with machines." The sell is that the machine will do all this for $20 per month, which is "less than half the monthly dues of a typical gym membership." Unfortunately, this implies that the machine will do all of the exercises all on its own - which is clearly not the case. What the advert should say is that the machine gives its owner the necessary equipment to do all of the exercise that would be possible in a health club. However, the point is that the effort and the will power to do the exercises remains the responsibility of the human being, not the machine. "

Sample of Sources Used:

Bodenhausen, Galen V. and Jennifer Garst. (1997). Advertising's effects on men's gender role attitudes. Sex Roles: A Journal of Research, 36(9-10): 551+.
Preston, Ivan L. (2002). A problem ignored: Dilution and negation of consumer information by antifactual content. Journal of Consumer Affairs, 36: 263+.
Men's Health. (June 2007). Ad for Bowflex.
Sylvester, Alice K. and Max Sutherland. (2000). Advertising and the Mind of the Consumer: What Works, What Doesn't, and Why. St. Leonards, N.S.W.: Allen & Unwin.