Ad agency BBH has produced a pretty clever, hilarious ad for Swedish furniture giant Ikea.
The ad, promoting Ikea's 2015 catalog, is a pretty blatant spoof of Apple and, less directly, a satirical piece on tech commercials and over-the-top tech enthusiasm in general.
Here it is:
"Once in a while, something comes along that changes the way we live, a device so simple and intuitive, using it feels almost familiar," says Jorgen Eghammer, the "chief design guru" in the video. "Introducing the 2015 Ikea catalog. It's not a digital book or an e-book. It's a book book."
The ad is shot against a white backdrop, purposefully reminiscent of Apple product demos, and Eghammer speaks with exaggerated enthusiasm about the magical "book-book" lovingly describing its many features, which include easy bookmarking (via bending the corner of a page), "eternal" battery life, and "no lag" when turning to any of the pages.
It's a pretty great little satire of tech enthusiasm. And even though it's an ad for a catalog, I see it as a sort of homage to books in general.
Actually, it reminds me of the Norwegian sketch "Introducing the Book" from seven years ago, before the rise of the iPad:
So far the Ikea ad, which was posted yesterday for Ikea Singapore, has seen over 600,000 views.
It has the makings of a viral hit, something I've discussed in the past. We'll see if it takes off, something far more likely if it lands on Ikea's main YouTube channel and starts getting picked up in the West.
