'Man plums' beer ads pulled from the internet

REFRESH: The new Foster's advertisement for Carlton Draught has been pulled from the company's website.

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Foster's Beer has pulled an advertising campaign that it admitted was too risque for TV just days after it released it online.

The series of seven ads for Carlton Draught, which make reference to ''man plums'' and ''goolies'', were put on the internet last Wednesday.

The company aborted a TV campaign in late February days before it was due to go to air, after senior executives in the listed alcohol manufacturer got cold feet about the ads.

The company then decided that having spent the best part of the A$200,000 (NZ$258,809)in fees and production, it felt compelled to release it on the internet in the hope that somehow only its target market of 18- to 30-year-old men would see it.

That strategy appears to have failed and in the past few days, as the ad got more talked about and viewed on the internet - normally something that every marketer craves - Foster's management pulled the plug, fearing a public relations backlash.

No reason was given by Foster's as to why the ads were pulled from the Carlton website www.anyexcuse.com.au, which was created to "test" the ads online before considering whether they should see the light of day on television.

Yesterday a Foster's spokesman issue a short, blunt statement: ''The ad and the campaign is finished. We have nothing further to say.''

The ads, by Foster's agency Clemenger BBDO Melbourne, feature a trio of oddballs singing little ditties about how the urge to have a beer manifests itself in strange ways. In one, a driver is forced to pull over to a pub after experiencing the Carlton Draught tingle in his goolies and his man plums.

The cancellation of the ads will be an embarrassment for Foster's beer division Carlton United Breweries for what appears to be significant indecision.

Last week CUB marketers admitted to a ''lapse in judgment''. Vincent Ruiz, the group marketing manager at Carlton Brands, told the Sydney Morning Herald: ''I believe our target market will go looking for Carlton Draught material online. And online, it's unable to offend anyone.''

Sources at the brewer have indicated that it has, and that the company rather than the Carlton brand team made the final decision to pull the plug on the ads.

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