What would Don Draper do?

The average Kenyan high street can hardly be described as an architectural wonder. In fact the main wonder is how the buildings stay up at all, as this photo from a building site across the road from our flat illustrates:

But they still manage to be fun and colourful, mainly because every house, shack or shop from Mombasa to Kisumu will be covered in advertising. I watched the advert below being done, so I can say with authority that they are hand painted and keep a lot of tradesmen employed. See what you think:




Eddie reckons the instant noodles look a bit too much like brains but I think it's pretty good. These next images were taken on our local high street, Mchumbi in South B:

No 1 Toilet Tissue; it's a bold claim! Not sure what the ASA would say

Nice & Lovely, well you can't say you weren't told!

A rather creepy looking baby on Kapiti Road

And of course it's important to make sure that potential customers know what you sell:




Big brands do adapt to suit the local market as well. One of our favourite slogans is from Kenchick, a popular fried chicken chain: "we're kuku about chicken!" ("kuku" being Swahili for chicken - you see what they've done there, right?). I can't quite imagine McDonald's copying the advert from Hatchers Inn below; back home the very idea that chicken comes from an animal freaks a lot of people out:

Likewise this advert from Barclay's always makes me chuckle. Kenyans love to use the phrase "by the way", usually to introduce a topic that is no more "by the way" than Hull is "by the way" of Timbuktu, or even to start a speech: "By the way, I am here today to urge my brothers and sisters in the disability sector not to be downhearted...". I can't imagine an ad agency back home wasting three words of copy on not much, but they are three words that have cultural resonance here.

I spend a lot of bus journeys and walks home wondering what Don Draper would make of it all: love it or hate it? Personally, advertising is one of my favourite things about Kenya: it smacks of brash optimism, relentless colour and a willingness to turn even the drabbest of views into a splash of consumerism. At least we know Don Draper would appreciate the men's fashion in this sign:

But of course the brand getting the biggest ad-space is always the Big-G; yep, the dude upstairs. Buses and matatus are plastered in slogans about the almighty and his only son and bill boards proclaim the latest out-of-town preacher promising marriage/ faithful husbands/ the-moon-on-a-stick. As just one example among a kazillion, this sign outside a doctors office made us smile/ really hope we didn't get sick: