Reading Response 2--Visual Text

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Corona approaches visual advertising in a less grandiose way than most beer companies who seem to show off their success with historic truth about their product, demanding respect…or with sex appeal. Their billboards, commercials, and magazine ads are simple and witty, and a common factor in most Corona ads is the beach scene. One particular Corona ad titled, “separation anxiety,” shows a bottle of Corona laying on its side on the beach on the far left with a lime wedge on the far right. Another Corona ad shows three bottles of Corona in a row along the beach. The first two have a wedge of lime in the top of the bottle, and the third, an entire lime sitting on top with the punch line, “greedy.” The consistencies between multiple ads by Corona are key to the basis of what, besides beer, they are selling.

For Corona’s ads to work, understanding little cultural understanding is necessary, but key. The wit of the single word or simple phrase of the tag line isn’t quite as humorous without the knowledge that Corona is typically served with a lime wedge. Without this understanding, the phrases matching up to the picture isn’t catching the attention of the viewer. What makes Corona’s ads so memorable are the connection of the short phrase with the ‘bottle of beer vs. lime’ saga. Corona is counting on the public to know that a Corona is not complete without its lime.

But what is Corona telling us? Not that their beer tastes delicious. They set their bottles of beer up in symbolic situations of today’s society. The tag lines of Corona ads like, “separation anxiety,” and “greedy” shed a humorous light on some of the exaggerated over-used excuses society is trying to comfort its people with. This is partly reinforced with the laid back attitude of the ads. The direct visual appeal of sitting on the beach allows the consumer to make a connection to relaxation. Corona is telling us that we deserve things to make life easy. Without them, it is socially and culturally OK to experience separation anxiety from these things. Greed is not a bad thing—not in America. The more, the better.

Beyond just telling you their beer is good, great, or better than anything else out there, Corona succeeds in embedding their ads in our memory. The satirist connections between human need or fulfillment through simple pictures of bottles of their beer’s need for a lime may tap in on something a little more than just our sense of humor.