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Ode to Joe’s

Ode to Joe’s

A homemade tribute to the Trader Joe’s grocery store goes viral.

Posted Tuesday, February 17, 2009 - 6:58pm

“Cashews flavored with chili and lime.” “Ten brands of soymilk that all taste the same.” It can only mean one thing: a Trader’s Joe supermarket. Is this fan’s celebration a “Stuff White People Like”-style turn-off, or does it give you the munchies? Watch and decide for yourself in this edition of YouTube Brand Watch.

 

 

Name: If I Made a Commercial for Trader Joe's
Stats: Posted to YouTube on Jan. 27, this 2 minute 51 second ode to Trader Joe's has attracted more than 200,000 viewings and more than 450 comments. Not huge by viral-video standards, but impressive nonetheless when you consider the specialty grocery store has been more or less ignored by YouTubers over the years—unless you count a parody training video that's thin on laughs.
What you see: First, the title of the song, "The TJ's Song." Then we see the customer's Palm Treo enter the picture, which, we are to assume, is how he/she shot the next 2 minutes and 40 seconds, capturing every bizarre product you can find at this particular Trader Joe's store. An acoustic guitar strums a few chords, and we're off: "It's milk. It's bread. It's the stuff on your list ..."
Takeout/Takeaway: “The TJ's Song” was conceived by Carl's Fine Films, a San Francisco-based film production team that's done work for plenty of big brands through the years—Nabisco, Ford, even the U.S. Census. Trader Joe's isn't in their roster of clients. The inspiration to film a covert Trader Joe's commercial came when one member of the CFF team was castigated by a store manager for trying to take a photo inside the store. They went back and secretly filmed on a Treo.
Social Media Effect: Why is Trader Joe's so secretive? The quirky grocery store chain has never done a TV ad, says the Carl's Fine Films crew. This no doubt explains why it has such a weak brand presence on YouTube—just a few dozen silly amateur videos. Will an annoyingly catchy tune by Carl's Fine Films, done without permission, force Trader Joe's to embrace the wider world?

YouTube BrandWatch is The Big Money's exploration into how the world's best-known businesses, so adept at managing their images offline, are being perceived online, where control is harder to come by. Every week, The Big Money features a corporate-themed video that's had significant viewership on YouTube: some approved, some unapproved, some mashed-up combinations of the two. And we'll ask our readers to vote on how the video affects the brands. We think the responses will surprise you, and provide a window onto what is fast becoming the most important playground for corporate games. (Note: This feature has no official relationship to YouTube or its owner, Google.)

 

 

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  • Bernhard Warner is editorial director of Social Media Influence.
  • Matthew Yeomans runs Custom Communication
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