Well, it's happened. Bell has finally retired its two spokesbeavers, Frank and Gordon. To their credit, Bell gave them a blast-off: today's full-page ads declare, "It's been a blast!" And, to ease our pain, the pair claim to have been called back to the forest by "Nature" in order to teach a new generation of spokescritters. This announcement, though somewhat unimaginative, came as a relief. Realizing that their time with us was coming to an end, I feared we might see something like this, instead:"Uh, Frank, what do you think we should do, now?"
"Well, Gordon, with all the channels that Bell offers on its ExpressVu Satellite TV service, we shouldn't have any problem finding enough shows to occupy our time."
Unlike some people I know, I will truly miss the rodents. I remember their audition, broadcast in 2005. Poor Gordon fainted, he was so scared. But, they did their product proud and, despite their detractors, they were responsible for Bell's most successful ad campaign (commercially and emotionally). Lately, though, Frank and Gordon had become less than three-dimensional (okay, less than two) and one could detect a kind of "beaver fatigue" setting in at the ad agency.
Still, Frank and Gordon proved, once again, that people react more favourably to messages delivered by non-humans than to those delivered by members of their own species. What a revelation that must have been to the telecommunications company's execs! Less than a decade ago, Bell Mobility ran this ad campaign against its rivals, all of whom were using animals in their commercials:
"No frog, no dog, no ape, [therefore] no bull."
I guess they had to eat their words...which reminds me of one of the beavers' commercials -- the one in which Frank tells Gordon he's looking a little heavy and that he should go out and exercise. He won't miss anything, he explains to Gordon, because with Bell's video recorder, he can pause live television and catch up on Olympic events when he gets back. Gordon mumbles that they'd told him that the camera would add ten pounds. Frank, in frustration that Gordon doesn't understand that his weight gain is real, not virtual, exclaims:
"I'm lookin' right at you!"
Here's lookin' at you, guys!
