Extraordinary Ordinary Detergent

In Russia comparative advertisement is illegal. This way, in Ariel commercial this detergent is always compared to a plain and no-name Ordinary Detergent. You see, Ordinary Detergent cannot wash away those nasty coffee stains but Ariel can. When P&G spent millions and millions on dollars on promoting Ariel, a Russian company “Nevskaya Kosmetica” launched a new brand of detergents. Guess, how they called it? Right. “Ordinary Detergent” (Обычный порошок) that doesn’t work wonders and doesn’t need to.

How often your clothes are so dirty that nothing but Ariel can wash it clean? Not often. That’s why you need a cheap alternative. The brand that P&G featured so many times in its commercials. You usual “Ordinary Detergent” for everyday washing of clothes that are not stained. And by the way, in Russia comparative advertisement is illegal. So we don’t want our brand compared to Ariel anymore. That wasn’t much of a problem for P&G. Next time they compared Ariel to a Cheap Detergent.

I’m not sure if Ordinary Detergent is successful but many people thought is was fun to buy it. And anyway, Nevskaya Kosmetica didn’t spend a kopeck to build name recognition. P&G did it for them.