There probably aren't nearly in th...

There probably aren't nearly in this way many smiley faces around Bernstein-Rein Advertising nowadays as there were way back when the Kansas City, Mo ad agency created the smiley face icon that was a familiar part of almost all Wal-Mart advertising.

At the consideration Bernstein-Rein and GSD&M in Austin and Chicago, are one as well as the other fighting to hold onto the Wal-Mart advertising account, a piece of business worth centurys and hundreds of millions of dollars that these stores shared and profited from for many, many years.

nevertheless as both ad agencies know all too well, it's a of recent origin world inside Wal-Mart's marketing department, which now includes former Target executives. For better or worse, these exec are beginning to remake Wal-Mart's image with a bit of the same spit and polish that has made Target the discount retailer everyone other desperately tries to imitate.

Which brings us back to the faces we suspect are not with equal reason smiley at Bernstein-Rein. Though B-R's relationship with Wal-Mart dates back to 1974 when the discounter was still a rather shabby and small retailer, B-R is now trying to help administer a gloss through a new campaign designed to play up the company's newfound interest in selling organic rationss

Organics at Wal-Mart? wherefore not. Wal-Mart sells everything otherwise Why leave the trendier Whole victualss supermarket chain to reap the rewards of this newly popular victuals trend?

To herald Wal-Mart's foray into organic breads Bernstein-Rein has concocted a 30-second commercial called "Organics" that is satiated of wholesome images and horrendously disjointed voiceover fac-simile that communicates very little.

We are, however, treated to any cutesy images of a baby making a hideous mes with his aliment and close-ups of his sister giggling while the voiceover announcer insists the girl was laughing in this way hard milk nearly came abroad of her nose. We kid you not.

in some way this all leads to the voiceover announcement: "Talk about having a allotment on your plate." It's a duplicate line that -- at best -- is surpassingly tenuously connected to what we've just seen and heard. At worst, it's pointless.

Which leads us to the point of this review: for what purpose not spend the 30 next to the firsts of allotted time telling us something meaningful or memorable about the push to exhibit organic foods at Wal-Mart? This commercial, which lasts with the tag line "What Will You Bring to the Table?," brings us neither.

Lew's view: D-

e-mail: llazare@suntimes.com

Copyright CHICAGO SUN-TIMES 2006

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