Most globally renowned brands have their own advertising campaigns in many countries. The problem is that what sounds good in your language sounds completely different in others. Many slogans invented in the native language sound quite ridiculous in a literal translation to others. And because of this, numerous silly yet funny mishaps occur.
Advertising managers who didn’t take their work seriously often neglected truly competent translators, resulting in advertising campaigns failing miserably. AdmiGram.com urges never to skimp on employees and to see where such economies can lead. Without laughter and horror, reading such things is simply impossible!
Lost in translation: funny advertising or brand errors
The German company F&K Waterhouse hardly suspected that by giving its bottled water the name Blue Water, it would go down in the history of global branding. Entering the markets of Eastern Europe and post-Soviet countries, where Slavic languages predominated, F&K Waterhouse caused wild laughter and bewilderment when its advertising slogan in literal translation sounded like “Vomit is the purest water.”
The Swedish company Electrolux, with all its pomp, decided to enter the US market, offering its latest vacuum cleaners. However, it couldn’t even imagine that its advertising slogan about perfect cleaning would sound in English as “Nothing sucks like an Electrolux.”
When Coca-Cola decided to conquer China, it looked equally funny. The world-famous advertising slogan about how pleasant it is to drink Coca-Cola literally called for “biting wax like a tadpole” in Chinese.
But it was even worse with Pepsi. Stunned and frightened Chinese demanded a ban on the sale of blue cans, on which they were literally offered to “drink Pepsi, and your deceased ancestors will rise again.”
KFC also suffered from incorrect translation when entering the Chinese market. The Chinese were literally shocked when a strange old man looked at them from the advertising poster and threatened to bite off all their fingers.
Equally funny was the case with Ford when it introduced its Pinto car in Brazil. Brazilian men burst into fits of laughter with tears because in Portuguese slang, ‘pinto’ means ‘tiny male genitalia.’
The next blunder by Ford advertisers was the Fierra model in Spain. Literally, it sounded like ‘Ford old lady.’ And the Ford Caliente model in Mexico – in slang, it sounded like ‘morally corrupt girl.’
By the way, Chevrolet also found itself in similar situations with its cars. In most Eastern European countries, the Chevrolet Kalos model literally sounded like ‘car made of dung.’
And the Chevrolet Nova model was terribly embarrassed in Spanish-speaking markets because the name ‘No va’ in Spanish literally means ‘It doesn’t go.’
The famous Mist Stick for hair curling awaited a complete fiasco in Germany. So real German ladies stared in horror at the boxes where they were offered to buy ‘Manure sticks.’
Coors beer also suffered in this context. In South American countries, anyone who drank a can of beer was threatened with a slogan of ‘suffering and enduring terrible diarrhea.’
When IKEA opened its stores in Thailand, they encountered a problem that their advertising slogan literally stated that everyone who bought their furniture would face bitter tears of disappointment.
