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10 Marketing Faux Pas (Sometimes, You Just Need a Laugh)

Having lived abroad, and speaking more than one language, I’ve seen my fair share of marketing mistakes that were just plain hilarious.

Today, I’d like to share some of the ones I’ve come across (and some you have probably already chuckled about). Hope you enjoy them. (And yes, the links are meant to be odd and funny too)

1. The classic: Chevrolet Nova (Yes, the car). In Spanish, Nova, pronounced “No Va,” translates to “Doesn’t go.” Not a great name for a car, obviously.

2. Life Fitness’ LF logo (4F in the Army means that someone is physically unfit for duty). Unfortunately for Life Fitness, the logo looks like 4F because the design superimposed the L over the F.

3. Coca-Cola, when it made it’s journey into China, was given a similar sounding name in chinese. Problem is the characters that were used actually meant “Bite the wax tadpole.” Now that’s unfortunate.

4. In Arabic, the Jolly Green Giant that gives us all that gives us all of his veggies translates to “Intimidating Green Ogre.”

5. Waterpik, that lovely laser shot of water machine you use to clean your teeth, has to go by another name in Denmark. Why? Because the word ‘Pik’ is the Danish word for the male genitalia.

6. This goes out to my friends at Bacardi (Yes, I do have one or two), besides the bottles in my cabinet. Bacardi once put out a fruit drink called “Pavian.” Pavian, in German, means baboon. Not sure that’s what Bacardi was going for.

7. Gerber, in French, means to stack/pile, or ‘vomiting.’ Needless to say, Gerber is not very popular in France for baby food.

8. Not to pick on Gerber, but when the company moved its products into Africa, they didn’t make any changes for culture–they used the same packaging as in the U.S. Problem: In Africa it’s common to put pictures of what’s inside the package. What was on the package, you ask? Pictures of cute babies.

9. Perdue chicken once had a slogan that went something like “It takes a tough man to make a tender chicken.” In Spanish, the translation became “It takes a sexually stimulated man to make a chicken affectionate.” Ouch.

10. And one of my favorites–because I live in Seattle and drink Lattes pretty much every day–mostly in the morning. Latte in Italy means milk, and in English it’s that great coffee drink we love so much. In Germany, however, Latte means erection.
Bottom line? Make sure that when expanding to different countries, take into consideration the translations you make, as well as any cultural implications that may exist in your new market. A few minutes researching the literal translations (as well as colloquial ones) could save you a lot of time, money, and face, later on.

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