Gruen Transfer, The: Series 4 - Episode 2 (ATOM Study Guide)

The Gruen Transfer (TGT) is a show about advertising, how it works, and how it works on us.

In the fourth season of The Gruen Transfer, inimitable host Wil Anderson will once again pick apart the seams of advertising with the extraordinary Russel Howcroft and Todd Sampson, ably supported by our rotating panel of Dan Gregory, Dee Madigan, Jeremy Nicholas, Bridget Taylor, Jane Caro, Rowan Dean and Carolyn Miller.

Old favourite segments including The Pitch – where two agencies compete to sell the unsellable – will return, along with another End-Of-Show Quest. Last year (2010) we voted for The Worst Ad Of All Time. This year (2011), we're pushing that idea further, hoping to identify and celebrate The Worst Product Of All Time!

By the way, last year The Gruen Transfer averaged 1.4 million viewers on ABC1 each week. Gruen Nation was the ABC's highest rating show of the year. Indeed, both versions of Gruen earned places in the top ten shows of the year. Transfer also won the 2010 AFI for Best Light Entertainment program.

The Gruen Transfer is a Zapruder's other films co-production with ABC TV. Executive producers are Andrew Denton, Anita Jacoby and Sophia Zachariou. The show was co-created by Andrew Denton and Jon Casimir. It is produced by Jon Casimir.

In this episode:

Latest ads to catch the eye – a stop-motion animation from Brazil, and coffee with film star celebrity endorser Julia Roberts; How do you sell – banks; the Pitch – to lower the legal drinking age to sixteen; Ad Crunch – fake advertisement for Skittles; the Worst Product Ever – the Textee thumb thimble.

Important topics in this episode include the range of persuasive methods used in bank ads to either appeal to customer loyalty, or to attract customers from rival banks; and the ethics and morality of producing sexually crude, fake ads for genuine products in order to gain attention.

Curriculum links

This study guide is mainly aimed at middle- and upper-secondary school levels, with relevance to:

• English
• Media Studies
• Graphics
• Ethics and Philosophy
• Psychology
• Business Studies
• Marketing
• SOSE/HSIE