The Halifax, in case you hadn’t noticed, is part of HBOS. That’s right, you know, the thoroughly buggered up financial institution that revealed losses of £10 billion earlier this week. At this sort of level, the numbers become unimaginable and thus kind of irrelevant. And the word “losses” is used in a literal sense. As in: We have no fucking idea where it’s gone.
I’m not sure about you but I can barely think of a better way to convey this frightening image of utter financial frivolousness within a bank than an advert that shows the staff of that bank randomly handing out five-pound notes to members of the public.
Thankfully for the purposes of this blog, the latest Halifax advert goes precisely down this route, which reminded me a bit of this early 1990s video of pop/art pranksters the KLF burning a million quid.
The advert retains the well-known and long-established Halifax motif of lots of people coming together into a wacky shape. But whereas it used to be an excited gathering of expensive extras with no discernible purpose or relevance, the people are all now coded as benevolent Halifax staff.
The point, to reiterate, seems to be that the bank’s staff will climb over and on top of each other in order to give away money. Luckily there’s a glaringly obvious nu-folk soundtrack to soften these troublesome images. But ultimately it doesn’t work. Basically, it’s another shit advert.