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Every once in a while, you come across a piece of advertising that makes you wonder, "just what was that marketing department thinking?" This is one of those times.

Karl and I were shopping for food at BJ's recently. Unfortunately, I was hungry at the time, and this often leads to buying of excess junk food. Boxes of chocolate pudding were eminently displayed at the end of an aisle, so I grabbed some for the house.

After all, everbody likes chocolate pudding.

A few days later, I was loading some chocolate pudding into the fridge, and took a look at the box. I found the image featured to the right, and was disturbed. It's just a bit too Jon-Benet Ramsey for me. Then I read the caption. I was more disturbed. Maybe I'm just twisted, but everyone else I showed this to found it freaky as well. And now I am sharing it with you.

I have this image in my mind, an image of a few stylish yuppies sitting in a post-modern office somewhere on Madison Avenue. They are in a spacious room with a light hardwood floor and white walls. Well, the walls would be white if it weren't for the pastel polygons painted randomly. Large curves of stainless steel jut out from the wall and sweep to the ceiling, terminating in small point-source halogen lights. Floor to ceiling windows look out onto the avenue, hundreds of feet below.

Marketroid #1: (excitied) I just got off the phone; we've got the Hunt's Chocolate Pudding account! I'm sure you all know how important this is to our firm. We need to make a committment to refocus their advertising campaign on their core competencies, and bring them to the forefront of the pudding market.

Marketroid #2: Yes! All of our industry projections show that pudding is the next big thing. But, currently this is a mature market. Competition is high and the consumers are ingrained. We need to find a new niche for this product to really take off.

Marketroid #3: What markets aren't currently served by today's pudding offerings?

Marketroid #1 rests his chin on his hand and looks contemplative. He makes sounds of introspection. The others in the room mirror his behavior.

Marketroid #1: (snaps fingers) I know! Pudding for Pedophiles!

Marketroid #2: Yes, of course! The pedophile community is not being well served by the current marketing of chocolate pudding! This is a huge market that is being overlooked.

Marketroid #3 looks dubious. This quickly passes. Marketroid #1 opens his briefcase and removes a sheaf of papers. He shakes them at no one in particular.

Marketroid #1: (shaking papers) On a hunch, I had Marie run these numbers for me last week. I think they speak for themselves. This can definitely make our client the market leader in pudding and pudding-related products.

The team sits down at gets hard at work to determine exactly how to form this exciting new marketing campaign. Several hours later, preliminary designs are done, prominently featuring the image above.

Marketroid #1: Well, I'm glad that's settled. I'm sure that Hunt's will be pleased with this course of action. Now, next item on the agenda. Marvin, I'd love to hear more about this idea you have about Napkins for neo-Nazis. I think we can extend it to the whole line of paper products...