This is the sweetest Kindle commercial I’ve ever seen. A little girl peeking through a flower-colored curtains watches a mail truck arrive at her house. And her eyebrows go up as she spots a postman trotting up her steps, delivering a package from Amazon — as a voice-over begins.
“For years, we’ve been placing the things you love at your doorstep. Now, we’re placing them at your fingertips…”
You watch this ad — and all Amazon’s Kindle ads — at youtube.com/Kindle . The little girl rushes down the stairs — and hops over the family dog — while her dad, reading the newspaper, hears the excited footsteps and signs for the package. The little girl opens the package at the bottom of the staircase, and lifts out a Kindle Fire, while her father joins her and starts flipping through the tablet’s family-friendly choices, like a “Dora the Explorer” book or the movie “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
“Introducing Kindle Fire, a Kindle for movies, music, web browsing, apps, games, and of course, reading….”
In the last shot, the little girl seems fascinated by the Kindle Fire. (Though I’d wanted to believe that it was her new tablet device, it looks like her dad’s going to keep hogging it for himself!) Maybe the commercial’s real message is, “If the mailman delivers something cool to your house, your parents will just take it away from you…” Of course, it addresses an even bigger concern from the last Amazon ad about the Kindle Fire. The mailman in that ad simply left Amazon’s package behind on a woman’s front doorstep! (“People in America must really trust their neighbors,†joked one commenter on YouTube.)
That ad was released in November, when most people were still waiting for their tablets to arrive, so Amazon apparently wanted to remind them how happy they’d be when it arrived. (You can watch that ad at tinyurl.com/DoorstepAd .) What’s really interesting is that both ads use the exact same voice-over.
“For years, we’ve been placing the things you love at your doorstep. Now, we’re placing them at your fingertips…”
Amazon’s calling this new commercial “Dad and Daughter”, and it’s another fun look at the way Amazon is “positioning” their Kindles for the consumer market. But there’s also a small “continuity” error, if you watch closely. It looks like the mailman who finally delivers the Kindle is a different actor than the one that the little girl saw through her window. (The man trotting up her stairs had darker hair, plus a white t-shirt on under his uniform that went up to his neck!)
By the way, I also learned something new about Amazons other Kindle commercial. I’d watch a “friends” commercial online, where the blonde woman complains in surprise that the new Kindle costs less than her jeans or her haircut. I’d never seen it on TV, and wondered if I was just watching an “outtake” that Amazon had ultimately decided not to broadcast. Some of my wonderful readers contacted me to say that they’d seen it on TV — more than once! — and a third reader had the same reaction that I did. “I remember thinking it was weird, since it did seem to air after the one where she bought a Kindle for herself and her dad.” But then there was that same blonde woman again, now telling her friend “You know I can’t afford a Kindle….”
Apparently…now she can afford a Kindle!