Jonathan Pawlowicz
English 250
9 March 2017
Assignment 4 Visual Analysis
Marinella is an Italian necktie company that takes prides in its craftsmanship. Over the years, Marinella has chosen the path of quality over quantity. Luis Marie says in her article, “Nothing ups the suavity stakes quite like a traditional handmade five-, seven- or nine-fold tie”. This pride in elegance lead to the creation of their advertisement below. Marinella’s advertisement effectively promotes their products by focusing on their intended audience and using various rhetorical devices.
Showing off the E. Marinella brand is very important for this advertisement. Without the logo and name there would be no way of knowing which company it was. Some brand are inherently obvious. For instance, car advertisements or Harley Davidson advertisements do not need names because they are easily identifiable in the real world. Same can go for certain foods such as the Big Mac or Whopper. Ties are a completely different circumstance. Marinella wanted it inherently obvious what brand they were advertising. The other objects in the picture are chopsticks and ties made to look like sushi rolls on a white plate. The reason they chose sushi rolls was because the chosen audience was Japan. This makes sense because according to www.marinellanapoli.it , their home website, they have a store located in Tokyo. But why did Marinella choose ties for their advertisement. Their website sells countless other products such as bags, watches, perfumes, cufflinks. Why did they not use a bag in the commercial instead of the tie? Besides the fact that the tie is their key product that they’re known for, I believe that the tie was chosen because it is the most generic symbol of wealth and business fashion. The tie appeals to the largest crowd. The company will not thrive from their profits by selling bags, watches, perfumes, or cufflinks. The source of Marinella’s main profits will be from those ties found in the advertisements.
Another aspect of the picture worth thinking about is the white background. I believe white was chosen because it allows everything else to pop out of the paper more. Black letters on white background show a lot better than blue writing with a background on another shade of blue. Those are the only things happening in the picture. There is nothing in the background to distract you. The image is supposed to be ‘elegant’ and to the point. Many of Marinella’s advertisements follow the same style. For Lugano, it is a tie wrapped in a chocolate wrapper, paris is a tie the shape of a croissant, naples is a tie shaped coffee cup, portofino a tie shaped cup of ice cream. All of Marinella’s advertise specifically to the country that they are located in. To my surprise, according to their website, they are not located in america or anywhere in the Eastern Hemisphere. I believe the reason behind this is because america as a whole prefers quantity over quality, they prefer 10 ok ties at $20 versus 1 really nice tie at $200. However there is also a niche market for these kinds of ties within the United States. This includes the rich and top 1%. However for these people, traveling to other countries is not an issue. Therefore, these people will simply travel to a store whether it be in japan or France.
This advertisement focuses primarily in an appeal to pathos with the line “since 1914, the taste of elegance”. This sentence uses techniques that try to use its history and prestige to the sell the product. The taste of elegance is meant to send the message that the rich clothe themselves with Marinella. This is a classical bandwagon method. To be considered a rich person you have to have Marinella ties because everybody else wears Marinella.
In conclusion, The Marinella uses many classical tricks to get you to buy their products. Marinella emphasizes the locations of their stores and designs their advertisements around that feature. They also integrate their products into regular objects, such as making a sushi roll out of ties. Each advertisement has a geographical relevance, for example they do not push rolls of sushi in an advertisement directed to people in switzerland. Finally, they use bandwagon techniques to pressure people to buy their ties. In the end of the day, Marinella has created a great advertisement that attempts to pressure you into buying their products with the promise of elegance and prestige
Works Cited
Muir, Lucie. “Marinella Handmade Ties Naples.” Billionaire. N.p., 7 Jan. 2014. Web. 05 Mar. 2017.
“E. MARINELLA – Napoli – Official Site.” E. MARINELLA – Napoli – Official Site. N.p., n.d. Web.
10 Mar. 2017.