Thursday, September 27, 2018

Reverse Engineering (while hungry) - One Woman's Shocking True Story!


Well, maybe the story isn't all that shocking after all... I was trying to select an advertisement to reverse engineer and all I could think of to search for were foods...then I realized that I hadn't eaten lunch yet! So everything was looking really tasty. I settled on an advertisement for a Blizzard. Then I ate a salad. It didn't taste like a Blizzard at all.


This is an advertisement for the Turtle Brownie Blizzard at Dairy Queen. It is an older advertisement, so I wasn't able to find the designer, but it was used as an official Dairy Queen advertisement in 2012. I found this on the website www.dishblogger.com, which features a blogger's review of this particular Blizzard flavor. 


The alignment of the text is centered, as is the text on the Blizzard cup itself.


The colors used in this advertisement are heavily based in several shades of brown that represent the "turtle" (chocolate, caramel, and pecan) elements of the flavor being promoted. These colors are repeated throughout the piece, including the text, items in the forefront, and on the product itself (repetition of the color scheme circled in green above). The purple background was an interesting choice, but it does provide a brighter background and more contrast than using white or another shade of brown.


The red, white and blue colors of the traditional Blizzard cup and spoon (circled in green above) really stand out in contrast against the rest of the colors in the ad. This makes the cup the focal point of the ad, so the viewer immediately knows that this is a Dairy Queen Blizzard advertisement.


The proximity of the text that indicates the flavor being advertised (circled in green above) is nearest the specific food elements that comprise the flavor elements. The text on the cup (circled in red above) is with the actual product itself, which shows the viewer the final product being advertised for purchase.


This design relies on the repetition of several elements - the colors that represent the ingredients are repeated in the text that advertises the flavor and also shown in the final product Blizzard cup (examples of repetition circled in red, blue, and green above).

Overall, I would say that this is a very effective advertisement. It is eye catching and uses a lot of different design elements in a creative way.