Johnny churning up rot for Fonterra

UK butter brand Country Life has used aging punk rock star Johnny Lydon in its advertising to bizarrely attack the origin and flavour of Fonterra's Anchor brand.

While NBR chortles at the prospect of the man formerly known as “Johnny Rotten” pushing any kind of expirable goods, the latest round of Country Life advertising has caused a bit of a stir in the UK.

The ad campaign is running in daily newspapers and on radio until the end of the week, and features Mr Lydon cheesily busting through the newspaper page underneath a huge heading stating: “Anchor is from New Zealand!”

Followed by a chopped up newspaper font (similar to the cover of the Sex Pistols’ Album Never Mind the Bollocks… stating “SO?! I buy Country Life COS I THINK IT TASTES THE BEST.”

Country Life’s owner Dairy Crest instituted the campaign following a survey showing that 39% of British consumers mistakenly believe Anchor is a British product.

It is made in New Zealand by Fonterra and exported to the UK.

An anarchistic icon blamed by politicians in the late 1970s for destroying youth, John Lydon has been making an ass of himself in a variety of ways for quite some time now.

Even so, for the singer who penned the Sex Pistols’ classic ‘God Save The Queen’ (and got knifed for his trouble), to literally ‘sell out’ and push dairy products is a bizarre career move.

Fonterra and other Kiwi exporters have long been battling the food mile movement in the UK, which denigrates products by the distance they’ve travelled rather than by the efficiency of their production.

Strangely, Country Life's argument this time round seems to be over food quality and taste.

No one anywhere in the world could seriously suggest that a butter made in the UK could beat Kiwi quality, a sentiment echoed by Fonterra Shareholder’s council chairman Blue Read.

“I think they’re barking up the wrong tree quite frankly,” he told Radio New Zealand this morning.

Federated Farmers went a step further, inviting the aging punk rocker to come down under to experience the free-range difference personally.

“Grazing outdoors on GM free grass and natural winter feed makes for happy cows and fantastic quality milk.  This milk is crafted into quality butter and other dairy products and the only thing holding us back in the UK, is the European Union’s ridiculous tariff barriers.   
 
“One of our senior staff members, David Broome, lived in the UK for seven years.  He tried Country Life Butter, once, and described it to me in colourful terms that Johnny Rotten would understand,” Federated Farmer’s dairy vice-chairman Willy Leferink says.

Anchor is one of New Zealand’s oldest brands, started in 1886, and is now exported throughout Asia, the Middle East, the Pacific and the UK.