Imaginary Hamburgers

Imaginary Hamburgers

Fast food restaurants today have to be more cunning in the way that they advertise their goods to the public. In recent years these establishments have not gotten a good wrap. People want healthier choices. The two ads that I have chosen to analyze both represent the back bone of these establishments, the hamburger. The trick is that there is not an actual hamburger in either ad. The consumer is left to use their imagination to invasion what they will get when ordering at these establishments.

In the first ad, for McDonalds, there is a stack of books. All that you can see is the spines of the books. There is not much to look at, but so much to see. The bottom book is labeled The Very Best of Bread. There are many different kinds of bread in the picture on this spine. All are golden in color, and look appetizing and healthy. The second book in the stack is called Meat * New Edition. The meat on the spine of this book looks less like a hamburger and more like a steak with a nice big juicy piece cut out so that you can see the inside of this cut of meat. The third book is The Special Book of Cheese. This spine does not have much going on at first glance, but upon further investigation, at the top of the book you can see what looks like pieces of the cheese cut away haphazardly. This seems almost as if someone has been tearing pieces off to snack on because the cheese is so irresistible. The next book is just calledTomato. It has, as you would imagine, red, ripe tomatoes on the spine. They have the stem still on them, leading us to wonder if they were just freshly picked out of McDonald's organic backyard farm. The next book is titled The Encyclopedia of Salad. The spine has snippets of beautiful green heads of lettuce. The top book of the pile is calledBreads & Co. It has more breads on it like the bottom book, but they are different, though equally appealing in appearance.

This ad suggests to me that McDonald's is offering to us the idea that they have re-written the book on hamburgers. The book was obviously already written. Most of us have had a hamburger before, but this ad suggest that they have improved upon the process. Not only that, but they have gone about it in an almost academic, "foodie" manner. The bottom book with the breads on it gives us the idea that the bun, at least the bottom bun, is made from the "very best". The second is supposed to suggest that the meat used in the burgers not is not the "same old same old" that has been used by McDonald's, or even that which is used by the competitors. The third book in the book burger is the "special" book of presumably "special" cheese because, well, the cheese that McDonald's uses is no ordinary cheese. The next two books, the tomato and the lettuce look very fresh, as if they were just picked by someone's southern Grandmother from her very own garden, and then delivered right to McDonald's to put on my burger. The top book, again is the bread. Fresh, golden, healthy, unique, not at all the stale plain buns that we are used too.

This ad, while having no actual hamburger leaves the burger to the imagination. It lets us build up the anticipation about the hamburger that McDonald's would serve us should we walk into their facility right now. Or, if we drove up to their window, because some of us are already in our pajamas and just want a burger to enjoy in the privacy of our own home while we watch Doctor Who re-runs. I think that this ad is meant to build up this burger in our heads before we get the real thing, and possibly the letdown that comes with the real thing.

The second ad that I am analyzing does the same thing. It leaves the actual burger to our imagination. It is the Burger King ad with no burger. The ad has a bright yellow background, and the only thing, besides the Burger King logo, which is peeling up a bit at the edge, is a set of "hands". The only portion of the hands that are visible are a set of thumbs, and an oddly proportioned set of forefingers. The forefingers in the ad have an extra set of joints in them.

I think that the reason that the fingers in this ad are freakishly disproportionate is to lead you to believe that the burger they will serve you is so large, normal hands "need not apply". The coloring of the ad, the solid yellow background, is a color that is said to evoke hunger. It is a good thing that this color is supposed to make you hungry, the burger that Burger King is offering, seems to be so big that you will need to be famished in order to finish it!

                                         

These ads are tied together through the imagination. Both franchises let you know what is being offered without the exact details of what that is. Since most ads have pictures of fake "dressed" food, they have bypassed this step, and left it up to you, the consumer to envision the meal that you will get.