Just give her the Kinder Bueno!

Today, I was going to write about something completely different in France, but this TV advertisement came on and it annoys me so much that I had to write about it. Perhaps it’s just me applying far too much logic to a simple ad. It features top French tennis player Jo Wilfried Tsonga, and is one of three I can think of with him in similar situations, where he wants the last Kinder Bueno. Can you guess why this advert annoys me? There’s a translation below if you don’t understand the French phrases:

Translation:
Woman (thinking): I’m just a little bit hungry.
Woman: Good evening. The last Kinder Bueno please.
Shopkeeper: Someone has reserved it. How ’bout a fresh muffin?
Woman: That’s too much for me. What about offering the reserver these cookies?
Shopkeeper (looking majorly stressed, as if our mate Jo has a gun pointed at his head): I think he’d really prefer the Kinder Bueno.
(Woman turns, and Jo shrugs as if to say the Bueno is too hard to resist.)
Shopkeeper: What if you share it?
(Woman and Jo laugh like old friends.)

So what’s wrong with this ad? What’s right about it? Nothing is right about this ad.

PROBLEM 1: Who ever reserves a chocolate bar? Why does she even suggest the cookies instead of telling the shopkeeper where to go if he doesn’t sell her his goods?

PROBLEM 2: Why on earth does the shopkeeper looks so scared of Jo? Is he worried Jo’s going to volley a ball at him at close range? I mean it’s serious overacting going on there.

PROBLEM 3: Why doesn’t the shopkeeper have more than one Kinder Bueno? Do they not have more boxes out the back? Or another chocolate bar alternative that either of them would surely scoff down as an alternative if they like chocolate that much?

PROBLEM 4: Why why why why why is the woman so happy to share this chocolate bar that is rightly hers? She’s at the front of the queue, and I’ve never seen someone give up front-row seats for something just because the person behind them wants them. Had I been her, I would have grabbed the bar and done a runner before sharing, stopping only to stamp on both the idiot shopkeeper’s foot and the star tennis player’s.

About

I'm a technical author, journalist and writer from Australia who has been living in Europe since 2000 and exploring the world from there. My passions are writing, snow sports and travel.

10 Comments on “Just give her the Kinder Bueno!

  1. Our new year’s resolution was to watch more French telly to a)keep us up to date on the news, b) improve our French and c) force our youngest son to go to bed a bit earlier! We watch the 20:00 news every day with the surrounding pub and meteo. I thought that ad was severely weird too, but then a lot of French telly is! However, we do like Cantaloup.
    I hadn’t realised she was a tennis star. Whoops, still out of touch, must watch more TV!

  2. Maybe the man is actually scared of her, not of the player.

    Some tennis players, but I’ll name no names, have a special relationship with this type of sweet. And getting the last one is an added pleasure. This ad may be a king of private joke referring to that.

    There is no way the bar is “rightly hers”. It belongs to the shop man until he has sold it. I confess I don’t know what the law says, but I think he can sell the bar to whoever he wants, first in the queue or not. Of course, he has only himself to blame if he creates a riot.

    … You seriously would have tried to run faster than this guy? You’re a fit one.

    And a potential thief. Good grief! 😉

  3. Sab, you are of course right. And let’s face it, we’re better of with low-budget ads if it means better quality products instead of the other way round, right?

    Steph, it’s the guy who is the tennis player. He looks more like a rugby player to me with his build.

    Juliette, you’d get sick of it if you sat next to me long enough!

    Tonton, anything for chocolate. 🙂

  4. Your commentary is hilarious! I love how you actually really thought about how stupid this ad was and was so darn upset about the stupidity of it that you broke it all down for us. Cracks me up!