Jeremy Clarkson’s foul-mouthed Hawkstone lager advert - ‘cock up’ or clever marketing stunt?
Jeremy Clarkson’s latest advert for Hawkstone lager is littered with the F-word - is it really a ‘cock up’ or a clever marketing stunt?
Top Gear presenter turned infamous reality TV farmer Jeremy Clarkson has been on our screens for nearly forty years during which the star has courted controversy on more than one occasion. Which is why it’s hard to believe his new advert, punctuated with the F-word, is really the ‘cock up’ he has described it as.
In the latest ad for Hawkstone lager, Clarkson’s four-lettered formula has ensured maximum publicity with minimum advertising spend, in spite of it being banned by watchdog the ASA (Advertising Standards Agency).
Featuring a 34-strong choir of British farmers, the ad shows the singers chanting a foul-mouthed anthem which ends with the line, "F*** me, it's good". It then cuts to 65-year-old Clarkson sipping the drink and saying, "Hawkstone - it's f***ing good".
Unsurprisingly the ad - filmed at the Amazon star's Diddly Squat Farm in Oxfordshire - has been banned, with the ASA deeming it “not compliant” with advertising rules for TV, radio and cinema.
"It’s a cock-up, as usual," Clarkson said. "I’ve made my biggest, most heartfelt, and frankly, most expensive advert ever, and it’s been banned. The fun police in their beige offices have decided that the public can’t be trusted to watch it. It’s been kicked off the telly, silenced on the radio, and barred from the cinema."
Equally predictable, is the surge in online views of the ad - where the ASA ban does not apply. It racked up more than 500,000 views on Clarkson's Instagram account in 24 hours, amid his calls for newspaper owners to run it instead.
The controversy is aimed at boosting sales of Hawstone, which is co-owned by Clarkson and already boasting sales of some £21.3 million in the last year. It is served in thousands of pubs across the nation and stocked on shelves at major UK supermarkets.
It is the latest in a string of controversies the host has endured, as the fourth series of Clarkson's Farm runs on streaming channel Amazon Prime, so if he didn’t see this one coming he would have needed to be wearing some seriously strong beer goggles.
No, I’m rather inclined to think this media-savvy former-journalist knew exactly what would happen and is now sitting back watching the beer sales roll in, having spent very little getting his advert in front of the buying public.
And all power to him. Having entered two of the most difficult industries to turn a profit in - farming and the pub trade - it seems like a f***ing good idea to me.