Celebrity Sell Out

Emma in the Burberry ad campaign

Following yesterday’s dressing down from Mark over the CSO take on Alesha Dixon doing Toblerone, I am considering adopting a slightly different tone for the following piece. Harry Potter actress Emma Watson has grown up and bagged a role as Burberry brand ambassador and I’m going to be positive about it.

In addition, to be honest, the ads look quite nice. They’re shot by Mario Testino and look every bit as sloany as you’d expect, although the raincoat looks a bit grubby and creased.

But I have to say that for a brand that’s been under attack from the great unwashed and their Burberry rip-offs for some years, Watson fits the anti-chav bill perfectly. I mean it’s not like they let any old herbert into Hogwarts — indeed weren’t they once forced to deny banning some girl from a Potter audition because of her Essex accent?

But for all the neat snobtailing between campaign and celeb, there’s something about the campaign that troubles me (apart from it being a typical example of boring fashion advertising). It took me a while to figure it out because after all the shots are quite nice –- she looks a bit like Sienna Miller in fact.

That’s when I understood it, she just looks too young. She is like a kid wearing her mum’s clothes and while she might seem grown up, you knows she’s not. Indeed maybe what they wanted was Sienna Miller, who would have been both perfect and too expensive at the same time.

I would guess Watson was fairly light in the fee stakes seeing as she might find herself ‘resting’ fairly soon. When Harry P gives his wand a final shake in 2010 Watson will need to migrate to another franchise and fast. These days a stint as brand ambassador on a sexy (ish) brand is not too bad at all for the profile –- a case of speculating to accumulate. Or to put it another way, it’s like those interminable partnership promotions Lovefilm does.

One last point to follow on from yesterday’s comments. A word of warning, if you are a ‘marketing professional’ looking for insight, knowledge and are considering using this site for background, research or to impress your girlfriend down the pub. You do so at your own peril.