Monday, May 14, 2007

Washing the world's buttocks

Toto hoping Americans will warm to bidet-toilet | The Japan Times Online

Toto, the Japanese company that makes its most popular bidet-toilet, plans to expand into the American market. According to the article:
Toto's bidet-toilet first gained public attention with a landmark TV commercial in 1982, which carried a promotion phrase: "Buttocks, too, want to be washed."
Somehow, I think the US advertising agencies are going to have to come up with something better than that.

By co-incidence, I recently noticed an advertisement in a Brisbane newspaper for a Hyundai brand toilet bidet. I have found this Bidet Shop website about them. The copy seems not exactly written by a native English speaker, and one claim in particular is new to me:
With the push of a button the HYUNDAI Bidet toilet seat will gently clean you and depending on which model you require, will perform many other functions, a few being dry and massage, that will leave you thinking "why didn't I have a HYUNDAI Bidet years ago."
What exactly does the Hyundai toilet bidet massage??

The Bidet Shop website also gets, well, more than a little carried away with its "health issues" page. (I don't think I can link directly to that page, you have to use the navigation button on the left of their main page). Believe me, it is well worth visiting, to read stuff like this:
In more than a few ads for bidets, doctors claim the device may even prevent colon cancer, but we have found no study so far that substantiates that. Despite the lack of hard data, it seems reasonable that just the thought of a device that might prevent surgeons from one day removing a substantial portion of your rectum would create a frenzied run on bidets.
It is accompanied by a photo of surgery, presumably of someone having their rectum removed because they failed to buy a toilet bidet.

How could an ad agency improve on that?

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