Sloganeering

I have recently been browsing through the newspapers looking at adverts for residential projects. Apart from the fact that 'being up to date' in such matters is my job, at the moment I am also hoping to find my very own dream home without any heartache

Zuzanna Wiak

A s a future home owner I have recently started looking at newspaper ads from a different angle, namely by concentrating on their advertising slogans. This all started before Christmas when one developer began advertising its offer with the slogan: 'A flat for Christmas'. An excellent slogan, I thought. I immediately considered writing a letter to Santa, in the hope that maybe I would later find my new home among my presents under the Christmas tree. In the end I was afraid that after sending such a presumptuous request the only thing I would get from Father Christmas would be a dolls' house instead of a three-room flat...
As I'm writing this piece, it is now early February and also the beginning of the commercial orgy surrounding St Valentine's Day - a form of madness that has this year also afflicted our industry. Dom Development has come up with a rather amorous way to launch the sale of its new residential project, Derby 14: those who buy one of the apartments by February 14th will receive a romantic trip for two to Paris. Quite a good idea, particularly considering the fact that decorating a new flat always entails a period of sacrifice and stress. And in the beautiful and cosmopolitan French capital, at least for a short while you can forget about the 30-year mortgage that you've just taken out. The Valentine's influence was also evident in Robyg's promotional material. With a glance at one of their ads, I could see as many as three hearts, each with a certain amount inside it - PLN 397, PLN 568 and PLN 494. These were apparently the monthly instalments on offer, which struck me as being almost too good to be true. And that's because they were. On closer inspection there was also a mini-heart accompanied by some rather smaller print: "One person's instalment could be as low as this. But the second half of the mortgage repayments will have to be paid by your partner." How very thoughtful of them to point this out, just in case any of us had been deluded enough to imagine that this was the actual monthly sum that would be paid!
Let us close the seasonal promotions section, and have a look instead at how developers who see themselves as being in the business of dream-fulfilment advertise themselves. One such is Eco Classic. In its advertising for its Trio Apartments project, the claim is made that it is "the creme de la creme of 25 years of development experience and architectural art". A small point, but architectural art might actually be slightly older than 25 years. The marketing of Warsaw's Eko Park also seems to be aimed at evoking similar kinds of associations of exclusivity in potential buyers. However, I was still left rather baffled by its mystifying slogan: "Diamonds require a fitting setting". The same goes for another of the developer's ads in the same series, which shows a man drinking whisky in the privacy of his study. But whatever it is the adverts are supposed to getting at, surely the main point is that neither of them had any appeal for me. However, the most bizarre in this set of ads for the Mokotów project appears to be marketed at seafarers, featuring a photo of a handsome ship's captain in search of "a safe harbour". Well, don't blame me if the only people who come to your sales office have peg-legs and parrots on their shoulders.
More and more developers have been organising so-called 'open days' recently to allow potential buyers to get to know the buildings. I was surprised to see an advert for a Ronson estate proclaiming that it is 'opening the gates" to let the public have a look at their future homes before deciding to buy them. All this was accompanied by the heading: "You are simply not going to believe this! You are invited to our building site!" I didn't quite believe it either - well, what I find hard to believe is that it has taken so long for a developer to finally get round to letting people (who are about to make what could be the biggest purchase of their lives) have a good look at what they are actually buying. So I suggest to all of you who have never been on a building site that you put your wellies on and pop along to one of these events, and maybe in time this will become what it should always have been - normal practice. As another developer, Robyg, says in its latest slogan: "Only fools fail to take their chances..."