Advertising Gimmick

Is a very unique way to promote the sales of condoms with a singer as your spokeperson....

excerpt from EastSouthWestNorth.

The Xuecun Condoms (2/15/2006) (Netease) Xuecun is the name of a brand of condoms in China. According the the records, the trademark rights were registed by a Hebei province enterprise, registration number 3495517 valid between September 7, 2004 through September 6, 2004. Only the Chinese letters 雪村 and the phonetic spelling "Xuecun" were registered, without any associated images. Below is a photo of an early edition of the Xuecue condoms.



Alas, when the name Xuecun is mentioned, the general public will tend to immediately think of the singer Xuecun, famous for the song "All northeasterners are living Lei Feng's" (东北人都是活雷锋). (East Asian Economic News via Yahoo!) Acting on a tip, a reporter went into a pharmacy and saw the Xuecun condoms displayed with other brands. A female salesperson recommended to the reporter: "You buy the Xuecun brand. Xuecun is the image spokesperson for the company. He did commercials for them. Many people buy this brand." The reporter deliberately asked, "Who is Xuecun?" The female salesperson laughed and said, "This one who sang 'All northeasterners are living Lei Feng's'. Everybody on this planet knows!" The reporter saw that the Xuecun condoms were manufactured by a Heibei company and sold at 25 yuan per packet. The box is green in color. On the top right corner is a cartoon drawing of Xuecun, with his tongue sticking out in the shape of a condum and holding a condom packet in his hand. The words 雪村 appear in the middle with "Xuecun." The product description is: Preventing sexual diseases begins with Xuecun.



When the reporter contacted Xuecun himself later, he was shocked: "I have never authorized this factory. I have never heard about th is. They used my name and image for condoms and this is an insult to my character." Xuecun has referred the matter to his lawyer. It is one thing to have an identical name (Xuecun means "Snowy village" literally), but it is something else to use an image. Does the real Xuecun look like the cartoon figure on the condom package?