Anyone who recently walked through a Penny class supermarket will not have noticed anything else, as is always the case in German supermarket branches. Especially not that a couple of cans with romantic sensitivity were stacked somewhere between Scheibletten cheese and a Dornfelder liter bottle. Penny markets actually differ from the dreary factory settings of the rest of the supermarket landscape only in their deplorable constant exposure. From the loudspeakers, moderators give great life advice nonstop with fermented happiness, but they always end with chicken thighs on offer or – “Sweet tooth, beware!” – discounted gummy bears.
In addition, Penny has used the brand’s own salutation “Dear neighbors!” selected for his communications. This is a cohort assignment that initially only seems slightly overbearing, but which you would rather avoid completely when you look at the people in the checkout queue. Penny neighbors, please be the others. To be honest, Penny was always more of the old Adilette among German supermarkets. But now everything is different, the chain has been mutating for a few days into a mouthpiece of sincerity and a cornucopia of citizenship. And thanks to a single one Commercials.
It is actually not necessary to summarize the clip, because in the two weeks since it was published it has already collected almost ten million views on YouTube. With such a development, one can assume that large areas of the country will be successfully infected by the end of the month. To make it clear again: These are millions of people who actively head for a supermarket commercial. For one very legitimate reason: to feel something again. How did the cheap market of all things manage to do what politicians failed to achieve in a pandemic of almost two years: to strike an emotional tone?
The short film looks like a middle-class chamber play, not like a discounter
Admittedly, the short film doesn’t look a bit like a branded discounter, strictly speaking not even like retail, because there are no chicken legs, for example. Instead, you attend a high-quality, middle-class, intimate play: At night, during pandemic times, mother and son meet and – tired, demoralized and unhaired – hold a confidential conversation. In the course of this, the boy’s missed moments and thus the topics of lost youth, coming of age, first love, family status and the general passage of time are sketched in a very emotional way and in fast motion. Who, according to the haunting message of these four minutes, thinks of the happiness of our teenagers in the lockdown years?
The answer, not least astonishing for teenagers, is: The Penny supermarket is thinking of it. Or rather the agency Serviceplan Campaign, which is responsible for this excellent stirring piece and has found an actor who looks almost like Timothée Chalamet. Like the actor who is currently jumping towards you everywhere in streaming cinema as a thoughtful young person with a contemporary look.
It’s amazing. God knows we do not live in times with little content, epic series, moving films and profound Corona documentaries can be found effortlessly, whoever wants could watch Kevin Kühnert for hours with very social democratic smoking in sterile infrastructure. But none of that is right, too far away, too close, too complicated, too brutal, too staged, too ironic. No corona hotspot, no Bohemian man and no talk show can still reach people in the late stages of the crisis. Many of them have long since hardened like superglue in a forgotten bottle through clapping, scared, hamstering, testing, doing without, waiting and vaccinating over the past few months.
There is only a very simple need for a little tenderness out there; that is the realization of the surprising advertising success. In any case, five thousand comments under the clip speak this language very unanimously: So touched, so touched, weeping such tears. Concert pitch: Finally, finally someone understands us! And at the same time the anger seeps through between the lines again, which is never far away in these times. Anger at the seemingly unmoved drivers and admonishers who now also make harmless citizens burst into tears in front of a penny commercial.
The spot follows a tradition of human supermarket advertising at the end of the year
In fact, you have to say it, more than all benefit concerts and calls for solidarity, more than warning words from the Federal President or urgent calculation examples from the virologist, more than the appeals of the barren Chancellor, more even than Helene Fischer at Thomas Gottschalk, this supermarket advertising now unites the country. She caresses the sore soul of the people and does exactly what the main characters in the fight against the pandemic have been neglecting for two years: credible and suggestive of understanding. Pay close attention to all the uncombed families. Take everyone in your arms. And then gratin the whole thing at 180 degrees with plenty of pathos. Just dare to have more empathy! It wouldn’t be very difficult at all. You just have to dare to do it.
Penny dares to do this with this spot. Which may not be in the tradition of the supermarket chain, but certainly in the tradition of human supermarket advertising at the end of the year. The genre was founded in this country by the Edeka Christmas commercial “Homecoming” from 2015, in which a tear-drenched drama was presented in one and a half minutes, at the end of which a family had come closer both internally and externally. Since then, Edeka has been repeating this story in variations: sometimes a robot looks for a family in front of a dystopian backdrop, sometimes a misanthrope without a migration background experiences a Christmas miracle with just such a family. The Jung von Matt agency, which sells these kitsch-related short films with great virtuosity, has also done similar things for other brands – the spot for the DocMorris mail-order pharmacy from last year is particularly noteworthy. A senior, who is no longer too sprightly, trains devotedly in order to be able to be present again with the family on Christmas Eve. Concrete bollard if you don’t howl into the keyboard.
It doesn’t always have to be heartbreak with old people. In neighboring countries, for example, a new advertising film for the supermarket chain Tesco is currently trending, which once again propagates brave perseverance with lively choreography and celebrates Santa Claus with a vaccination certificate. Motto: Nothing’s Stopping Us! At the end of the brisk little film you are at least inclined to say for a moment: Yeah! Consumer-oriented feel-good kitsch at Christmas is of course nothing new. But this year he is meeting real needs. It’s cold, the prices for heating oil are high, the fairy lights from the Christmas market are packed up again without being used and you stand in line for hours in the dull twilight for a PCR test. It is clear – the whole country urgently needs emotional heat pumps!
By the way, in the credits of the Edeka Christmas films there is still a roast goose and a pile of red cabbage around, as a vague reminder of the Christmas shopping. Penny has also freed himself from this banal necessity – you shouldn’t buy anything, on the contrary, in the end the supermarket only praises its reward campaign for young people. That of course simplifies the reception and applause for the film again. But it also raises the question – what if the federal government had commissioned this spot? You don’t have to be a graduate Kassandra to suspect that the applause would have been more restrained. But supermarkets have no credibility problem and are not in any way to blame for the misery. They were always present in this crisis – first when their empty pasta shelves made the seriousness of the situation clear, later when the last open places kept a kind of everyday life going – with heroic employees who demonstrated their systemic relevance. Supermarkets have taken over the supply of food and toilet paper in difficult times. So it is only logical that they now also take care of the spiritual care of the people. Nobody else does it. Hurray, hurray, penny neighbor!