I remember when Joe Camel, the hip mascot for Camel cigarettes, was shamed out of the advertising game. There were two accusations levied against poor Joe. The first was that the cartoonish nature of the ads, which generally featured Mr. Camel living the glamorous life while smoking, made cigarettes more appealing to kids. Not sure I completely agree with that but I got the point. The other accusation, which I never understood, was that his nose was some kind of a phallic symbol.

OK, now on closer inspection I see it, but at least it only looks like a penis, it’s not doing any of the things penises do. The same can’t be said for this ad I came across on a train platform here in Chicago for Sprite Green, the newest version of the lemon-lime sensation that is sweetened with cane sugar instead of anything artificial.

Apparently faced with a lack of creative ideas the ad agency decided to use the bottle to represent a penis next to a pair of lips. To top it off they decided to put a white spalsh of some sort coming out of the end of the bottle onto the lips. The copy across the top, “100% naturally sweetened” just adds to the fun.

I surely don’t know the product benefits of Sprite that is sweetened with cane sugar instead of whatever Sprite is normally sweetened with, but if I am to gather anything from this ad, it has something to do with oral sex.

Maybe I should go buy some